News

Wednesday September 15, 2010


Judge Orders Louisiana Abortion Clinic Back in Business – For Now

By Peter J. Smith

BATON ROUGE, Louisiana, September 15, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A state judge has decided that an abortion facility shut down a week ago by the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals for substandard medical protocols, can go back in business until a hearing next Tuesday.

On September 3, the DHH revoked the operating license of Hope Medical Group for Women in Shreveport after agents found the abortion facility’s staff failed to provide women a physical examination prior to abortions. Physicals are necessary to screen for and prevent devastating health reactions to anesthesia.

DHH agents found that in 14 cases of abortion they reviewed, the abortion facility did not have a trained professional monitor its clients respiratory, cardiovascular, and consciousness levels after the administration of intravenous and gaseous anesthesia.

Yesterday, a Massachusetts abortionist was sentenced to six months in prison as part of a guilty plea in the death of a client who went into cardiac arrest on the operating table under anesthesia. Laura Hope Smith, 22, subsequently died because Dr. Rapin Osathanondh failed to have her vital signs monitored while he aborted her unborn child. (see coverage)

However, Hope Medical Group for Women has challenged the DHH’s evaluation that their practice exhibited “significant violations of health standards’’ and filed a lawsuit Monday alleging they were given no prior warning before being shut down. They also countered they have “an excellent safety record” and there was “no reasonable basis for the Department to conclude that the alleged conduct underlying the Immediate Suspension posed a threat of immediate or imminent harm to a client or patient.”

On Tuesday, Judge Mike Caldwell of the 19th Judicial District Court issued a temporary restraining order on DHH’s closure of the facility, allowing it to resume business. According to the suit, Hope Medical Group for Women kills between 200-300 unborn children per month.

DHH Secretary Bruce D. Greenstein strongly condemned Caldwell’s order, and accused him of putting “the special interests of this abortion facility over the health and safety of women.”

“The findings of the Department’s survey included several egregious safety violations and at least one resulting in immediate jeopardy. The Department’s conclusion was that women visiting this facility would have their health and safety compromised,” Greenstein said.

Greenstein expressed chagrin that Caldwell signed the order without notifying DHH and also “without any effort to hear from medical professionals about the risk to the facility’s clients posed by the violations our inspectors found.”

Greenstein said his department remained committed “to fight to protect Louisiana residents and to shut down activities that put women in harm.”

Caldwell has scheduled a hearing for a preliminary injunction on September 21, just as Louisiana pro-life groups kick of the fall pro-life prayer vigil known as 40 Days for Life. The hearing will determine whether the order remains in place until the trial, when the facility will contest the loss of its operating license.

“It could go either way right now,” Benjamin Clapper, Executive Director of Louisiana Right to Life Federation told LifeSiteNews.com. “We’re just praying that Judge Caldwell’s heart is softened.”

The Hope Medical Group for Women is the first abortion clinic that has been shut down under a state law passed in June that empowers the DHH to shut down the operation of an abortion facility if DHH investigators find the facility is violating the law and poses “an immediate threat to the health and safety of a patient or client.”

The law brought outpatient abortion facilities into compliance with Louisiana’s regulations that already apply to hospitals. Under the law, if the licensed owner of the facility found in violation loses his operating license, then all abortion facilities licensed under that owner would also have to cease their operations.


See related coverage by LifeSiteNews.com:

Abortionist Pleads ‘Guilty’ to Manslaughter – Sentenced to 6 Months in Jail

https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/sep/10091405.html

Louisiana Abortion Clinic Shut Down for Ignoring “Most Basic” Medical Practices

https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/sep/10090707.html

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