Health care provider sues over Idaho's strict abortion ban

BOISE, Idaho (AP) — A regional Planned Parenthood organization is suing Idaho over a new law that bans nearly all abortions by allowing potential family members of the embryo to sue abortion providers.

The law, which is based on a similar one that Texas enacted last year, was signed by Idaho Gov. Brad Little last week. At the time, the governor said he supported the anti-abortion policy but was worried the enforcement mechanism of the law would soon be “proven both unconstitutional and unwise.”

Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawaii, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky, which operates 40 health centers across six states, filed the lawsuit with the Idaho Supreme Court on Wednesday.

“By passing this cruel abortion ban, Idaho lawmakers are deliberately making Idahoans’ health care decisions for them," Dr. Caitlin Gustafson, a family medicine specialist who is joining Planned Parenthood in the lawsuit, said in a statement. "They will be directly preventing physicians in Idaho from providing critical medical care that our patients need and that we have trained our entire careers to provide. This law eliminates personal freedom and places Idahoans’ health and future in the hands of politicians.”

Under the law, even extended family members like aunts and uncles of the patient seeking the abortion or the person who impregnated them could sue an abortion abortion provider for more than $20,000 in damages. While rapists are barred from suing under the law, a rapist's relatives could sue the rape victim's abortion provider.

It applies to abortions carried out any time after six weeks of pregnancy — well before many people even know they are pregnant.

If the high court doesn't intervene, the law will take effect on April 22.

“Even setting aside the fundamental right to privacy in...