Dear John,

Ever since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, pregnant people have been suffering harrowing uncertainty about whether they might be denied essential medical care when they urgently need it.

That is what happened to my client Mylissa Farmer, who experienced emergency life-threatening pregnancy complications just short of 18 weeks into her pregnancy. Her doctors determined that her pregnancy was no longer viable and that she was at risk of severe blood loss, sepsis, and death. Despite this, legal departments at two different hospitals overrode her doctors’ medical judgment and denied her the emergency abortion care she needed.

At the National Women’s Law Center, we knew that what happened to Mylissa was both horrific and illegal, violating the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (“EMTALA”), the nearly four-decade-old federal law that ensures patients receive emergency medical care—including emergency abortion care.

We took swift action and filed a complaint on Mylissa’s behalf with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), asserting that the two hospitals violated EMTALA. Good news, the Biden administration agrees with us! CMS announced that these two hospitals violated EMTALA by failing to provide Mylissa the abortion care she needed.

Federal officials made it crystal clear: Denying someone emergency abortion care is illegal and won’t be allowed.
We are thrilled that Mylissa is finally getting some of the justice she deserves and that all hospital systems have a warning from the federal government that they are obligated to follow the federal law and to treat pregnant patients in need, no matter what state abortion bans are on the books.

And we’re not stopping there. We filed another complaint with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights, explaining that the hospitals also discriminated against Mylissa based on sex in violation of the Affordable Care Act by denying her the care necessary to preserve her life and health.

The National Women’s Law Center is committed to doing everything we can to ensure that people get the essential care they need.

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Justice for her. Justice for all.

In solidarity,
Michelle Banker
she/her/hers
Director of Reproductive Rights and Health Litigation
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