November 11, 2021

Indiana Abortion Complications Reporting Law Goes into Effect

photo credit: J. Stephen Conn / Flickr
After a three-year-long legal battle, an Indiana law requiring abortion businesses to report complications went into effect on Oct. 27.

The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the "Complications Statute" on August 2, thereby allowing the law to go into effect three years after it passed in 2018. The law requires doctors to report complications arising from abortions. Doctors who fail to report complications could be found guilty of a misdemeanor, spend 180 days in jail, and pay a $1,000 fine.

“This complications reporting requirement is long overdue,” said Mike Fichter, president and CEO of Indiana Right to Life. “It is extremely telling that abortion businesses fought to shield these complications from being reported. Now that these reporting requirements go into effect, any abortion business refusing to comply must be denied a license renewal according to the new licensing law passed in the 2021 Indiana legislature.”

Fichter said that Indiana Right to Life will confirm with the Indiana Department of Health that abortion businesses comply with the law.

“Full compliance with the complications reporting law must be one of the many areas subject to thorough state inspections of every licensed abortion business,” said Fichter. “Complications reporting is the law, not a suggestion.”

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