• Posted December 16, 2024

Texas Sues NY Doctor for Prescribing Abortion Pill by Telehealth

A New York doctor has been sued by the state of Texas for prescribing abortion pills via telehealth to a Dallas woman.

In a news release announcing the filing of the lawsuit, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton claims that Dr. Margaret Daly Carpenter violated state law by illegally providing abortion drugs across state lines.

"In this case, an out-of-state doctor violated the law and caused serious harm to this patient," Paxton said in the news release. "This doctor prescribed abortion-inducing drugs -- unauthorized, over telemedicine -- causing her patient to end up in the hospital with serious complications. In Texas, we treasure the health and lives of mothers and babies, and this is why out-of-state doctors may not illegally and dangerously prescribe abortion-inducing drugs to Texas residents."

The lawsuit is one of the first challenges to shield laws that Democrat-controlled states have passed to protect physicians after Roe v. Wade was overturned in June 2022.

Reaction to the Texas lawsuit was strident.

"Abortion is, and will continue to be, legal and protected in New York. As other states move to attack those who provide or obtain abortion care, New York is proud to be a safe haven for abortion access," New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a statement released Friday. "We will always protect our providers from unjust attempts to punish them for doing their job and we will never cower in the face of intimidation or threats. I will continue to defend reproductive freedom and justice for New Yorkers, including from out-of-state anti-choice attacks.”

New York doctors were equally adamant.

"The Medical Society of the State of New York (MSSNY) is very concerned by the reports of out of state public officials bringing legal action against New York physicians seeking to provide reproductive health care services to their patients," MSSNY President Dr. Jerome Cohen said in a statement.

“The MSSNY House of Delegates has adopted policy to protect practitioners licensed and residing in New York from legal or personal liability when delivering healthcare services to residents of New York State or any other state, whether in person or via telemedicine, when the services provided comply with New York State laws and regulations," Cohen added.

Mary Ruth Ziegler, a law professor at the University of California, Davis, said a challenge to shield laws, which could have a chilling effect on abortion pill prescriptions, was expected.

Still, "will doctors be more afraid to mail pills into Texas, even if they might be protected by shield laws, because they don't know if they're protected by shield laws?" she asked CBS News.

Texas bars nearly all abortions and has been one of the most aggressive states at pushing back against abortion rights.

Neither Carpenter nor the Abortion Coalition for Telemedicine, where she's co-medical director and founder, responded to CBS News' request for comment.

Abortion pill prescriptions are a key reason that the number of abortions nationwide have increased even as state bans on abortion took effect, CBS News reported. Most abortions in this country involve pills rather than procedures, according to the Guttmacher Institute.

But anti-abortion advocates have been emboldened to challenge the pills' use and seek ways to restrict their use under a conservative U.S. Supreme Court and a Republican Congress and White House, CBS News reported.

More information

The Cleveland Clinic has more on the abortion pill.

SOURCE: Texas Attorney General, news release, Dec. 13, 2024; New York Attorney General, news release, Dec. 13, 2O24; Medical Society of the State of New York, statement, Dec. 13, 2024; CBS News