New Arizona Law Requires Doctors to Say Abortion Is 'Reversible'

In an absolute triumph for bullshit, Arizona lawmakers passed a bill Wednesday that will require doctors to tell abortion-seeking patients that medication abortions are “reversible.” There’s absolutely no credible scientific evidence that abortions can be reversed, but what the hell, right?

The bill, SB 1318, was passed yesterday and is now headed for Governor Doug Ducey’s desk; it also bans people from buying insurance plans through the Affordable Care Act that cover abortions. As for the “reversible” thing, we can only imagine they’re taking that from the work of anti-abortion doctor George Delgado, who claims to have reversed abortions with high doses of progesterone. A crisis pregnancy center in Iowa now offers the “procedure,” which, again, has not been tested or replicated in any studies besides Delgado’s. Delgado tested the regimen on six women. Six. He reports that four carried their pregnancies to term and doesn’t have much to say about the other two.

One pro-life House rep, Regina Cobb, expressed concern about compelling doctors to make that claim, according to the Arizona Republic, saying, “We just don’t know the causes or what could happen after the medication has been given.”

True! Nonetheless, Cobb voted for the bill. It’s unclear whether Governor Ducey, who has said he’s against abortion, will sign it. Planned Parenthood of Arizona is furious: in a press release, their public policy director Jodi Liggett called it “simply outrageous,” adding, “Arizona women trust their physicians. Extreme policymakers are preying on this trust in order to further bad medicine, all in the name of politics, and not science.”

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