Abortions can continue at Missouri’s lone clinic
ST. LOUIS (AP) — A Missouri commissioner on Friday ruled that the state’s only abortion clinic can continue providing the service at least until August as a fight over its license plays out, adding that there’s a “likelihood” that the clinic will succeed in the dispute.
Administrative Hearing Commissioner Sreenivasa Rao Dandamudi granted what’s called a “stay,” which will allow the St. Louis Planned Parenthood clinic to continue providing abortions past Friday.
The state health department last week refused to renew the clinic’s license, but a St. Louis judge issued a court order allowing the procedure to continue through Friday.
St. Louis Circuit Court Judge Michael Stelzer wrote in his ruling that the order would give Planned Parenthood time to take their case to the Administrative Hearing Commission, where Stelzer said the licensing fight must begin.
The Administrative Hearing Commission scheduled a hearing on whether the state was right to not renew the license Aug. 1 in St. Louis.
The state has said concerns about the clinic arose from inspections in March. Among the problems health department investigators have cited were three “failed abortions” requiring additional surgeries and another that led to life-threatening complications for the mother, The Associated Press previously reported , citing a now-sealed court filing.
The Department of Health and Senior Services wants to interview physicians involved in those abortions, including medical residents who no longer work there. Planned Parenthood has said it can’t force them to talk.
The interviews are a major sticking point in the fight over the clinic’s license, and attorneys for the health department wrote in legal filings to the commission that physicians’ refusal to talk “presents the final, critical obstacle.”
But Dandamudi wrote that the physicians’ stonewalling “in itself does not constitute a failure to comply with licensure requirements.”
“Because DHSS relies substantially on the lack of these interviews as grounds for denial, we find there is a likelihood that Petitioner will succeed in its claim,” Dandamudi wrote in his order granting a stay, referring to the clinic and its effort to stay open.
A spokesman for the Missouri Attorney General’s Office, which is representing the state in the dispute, in a Friday email said attorneys are reviewing the order to determine next steps.
Planned Parenthood has said Missouri is using the licensing process as a weapon aimed at halting abortions.
The organization and its supporters plan to celebrate Friday in St. Louis and unveil a banner that “sends a strong message” to Republican Gov. Mike Parson and the state’s health director.
“We are relieved to have this last-minute reprieve, which means patients can continue accessing safe, legal abortion at Planned Parenthood in St. Louis for the time being,” said Dr. Colleen McNicholas, an OB-GYN at Reproductive Health Services at Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region, in a statement.