January 26, 2021

Kentucky Passes Abortion Survivors Protection Bill

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear (D)
Last week, a Kentucky bill designed to protect the lives of abortion survivors was passed into law without pro-abortion Gov. Andy Beshear's signature.

Senate Bill 9 was neither signed nor vetoed by Beshear. Because he took no action, the bill became law after ten days.

The bill requires medical professionals to take action to protect the lives of all infants who survive abortion, including those born with disabilities or who are not wanted by their parents. Doctors will be required to provide “medically appropriate and reasonable medical care, medical treatment, or surgical care” to save abortion survivors and “take all medically appropriate and reasonable steps to preserve the life and health of a born-alive infant.”

It also forces doctors to provide “medically appropriate and reasonable medical care, medical treatment, or surgical care” to abortion survivors as well as to “take all medically appropriate and reasonable steps to preserve the life and health of a born-alive infant.”

Doctors who fail to provide care to abortion survivors would be subject to felony charges.

Explaining why he took no action on the bill, Beshear falsely claimed babies never survive abortion. “Everybody on the side related to Senate Bill 9 agreed that it never happens,” he said. “And so this being something that never happens and would likely be illegal under other statutes, we ultimately did not sign it but did not feel the need to veto it.”

LiveAction News reported that CDC statistics from just five states (Arizona, Florida, Michigan, Minnesota, and Texas) showed over 100 instances in which babies survived abortions over the last ten years.