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Women suing over Idaho abortion ban say they felt like “medical refugees”
Four women suing over Idaho’s strict abortion bans told a judge Tuesday how excitement over their pregnancies turned to grief and fear after they learned their fetuses were not likely to survive to birth — and how they had to leave the state to get abortions amid fears that pregnancy complications would put their own health in danger.
“We felt like we were being made refugees, medical refugees,” said Jennifer Adkins, one of the plaintiffs in the case.
The women, represented by the Center for Reproductive Rights, aren’t asking for the state’s abortion ban to be overturned. Instead, they want the judge to clarify and expand the exceptions to the strict ban so that people facing serious pregnancy complications can receive abortions before they are at death’s door.
Currently, the state’s near-total ban makes performing an abortion a felony at any stage of pregnancy unless it is “necessary to prevent the death of the pregnant woman.”
Adkins’ fetus had a severe medical condition that meant the fetus would not survive the pregnancy. The illness also put Adkins at risk of developing “mirror syndrome,” a dangerous syndrome that can cause fatally high blood pressure and other issues, she said.
Kyle Green / AP
Adkins and her husband, John, decided to seek an abortion, and learned, after another ultrasound showed the fetus still had a heartbeat, that they would have to go out of state to get one.
Idaho law prohibits a woman from getting an abortion when a fetal heartbeat is detected, with the exception of cases of rape, incest or a “medical emergency,” defined by the law as “a condition that, in reasonable medical judgment, so complicates the medical condition of a pregnant woman as to necessitate the immediate abortion of her pregnancy to avert her death or for which a delay will create serious risk of substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function.”
“No parent wants to wish that when they look at an ultrasound they don’t see their baby’s heartbeat, yet here I was hoping that I wouldn’t,” Adkins said. “I wanted the decision to be made for us, and I wanted to end her suffering, so it was really hard to see that and know that we had the challenges ahead of us that we did.”
“I was not willing to watch my son suffer”
Kayla Smith cried as she told the judge how she found out she was pregnant for a second time on Mother’s Day of 2022, and how she and her husband chose the name “Brooks” for their son. She was around 18 or 20 weeks along in her pregnancy when the sonographer grew quiet during a routine anatomy scan, Smith said.
Brooks’ heart had fatal anomalies, and the young family could not find a pediatric cardiologist willing to attempt an operation. The veins supplying Brooks’ lungs were also abnormal, Smith said, and he would not survive birth.
Smith had developed dangerously high blood pressure during a previous pregnancy, and she was at risk of developing the condition called preeclampsia again.
“If I were to continue pregnancy not only would I risk my life with preeclampsia, I was not willing to watch my son suffer and potentially gasp for air,” Smith said, crying.
Idaho’s abortion ban went into effect two days before Brooks’ diagnosis, she said, making it impossible for her to get an abortion in her home state.
“We wanted to meet our son — that was really important to us — so we needed to do it in a hospital,” she said.
They took out a loan to cover the estimated $16,000 to $20,000 out-of-network cost for the procedure and drove more than eight hours to a hospital where doctors induced labor.
“All four of these women were overjoyed to be pregnant with their second child and all four of them received the worst news a mother can imagine,” attorney Gail Deady, with the Center for Reproductive Rights, told 4th District Judge Jason D. Scott during opening arguments. All of them sought abortions “to protect their health, to spare their babies from pain and suffering, and to remain alive and healthy to protect their young children.”
James Craig, a division chief with the Idaho Attorney General’s office, said the women and their attorneys are relying on hypotheticals rather than concrete facts to make their case. Under their proposal, a pregnant woman could receive her abortion for something as minor as stepping on a rusty nail — even though the risk of infection in that scenario could be easily treated by receiving a tetanus booster shot, Craig said.
“Unborn children have a fundamental right to life, and protecting the lives of children is a legitimate and fundamental government interest,” Craig said.
The state also has the same interest in protecting the lives of women, Craig said — and the abortion ban laws do both, he contended.
In the “rare circumstances where abortion is necessary” to prevent the death of the mother, Idaho law allows that to occur, Craig said. The women suing are trying to “usurp the role of the Legislature” by asking the judge to rewrite the law, he said, and that is not the proper role of the court.
Dr. Emily Corrigan, an ob-gyn who works in emergency medicine at Saint Alphonsus Regional Medical Center who is also a plaintiff in the case, told the judge how Idaho’s multiple abortion bans have created confusion for physicians and made it difficult to treat pregnant patients who need emergency care.
Doctors have had to “basically guess which pregnancy conditions would fall under the state medical exception,” Corrigan said.
“I have had other hospital staff refuse to participate in the care of my patients because of the lack of understanding of the laws, and this has caused patient care delays,” she said. “I have personally cared for several patients who have been denied stabilizing abortion care at other hospitals in Idaho. By the time they arrive at my institution, their conditions have deteriorated and have lead to increased complications that I need to manage.”
Several conditions can put the health of pregnant people at risk, she said. Some are caused by pregnancy like preeclampsia, and others — including some chronic illnesses and cancers — can be made worse by pregnancy, she said. In those cases, delaying an abortion might not cause immediate death but can cause a shortened life span or have dramatic effects on a person’s health, Corrigan said.
“We are not trained to wait until things become urgent or emergent. We are trained to prevent harm to our patients,” she said.
Marek Mnich/Getty Images
With the holiday season just days away and, with it, the commencement of shopping, many Americans may be wondering about what to gift to family members and friends. This is a popular time for selling and buying gold, whether it be in the form of jewelry or just simple gold bars and coins. And even though the price has been elevated for much of 2024, it can still be affordable for many in the form of fractional gold.
That said, there are multiple benefits of gifting gold bars and coins, particularly during this upcoming holiday season. Below, we’ll break down three big benefits buyers should be aware of currently.
Start exploring your top gold options online now.
3 big benefits of gifting gold bars and coins this holiday season
Not sure if gold is worth giving now? Here are three reasons why it could be a smart gift:
Rising value
Despite a small drop in the price at the start of November, gold has been on a steady upward trend for much of 2024, breaking numerous price records throughout the year before surpassing the $2,700 mark at the end of October. Currently priced at $2,702.94 per ounce, according to American Hartford Gold, gold is positioned to break additional records, possibly before the holidays even begin.
Understanding the real potential of rising value, then, buyers would be well-served by gifting gold bars and coins today, even if they’re in a smaller, more affordable size. Waiting, however, could cause the price to become prohibitive. So start your holiday gold shopping sooner rather than later.
Get started with gold here today.
A tangible investment
You can invest in gold in multiple ways but gold bars and coins are one of the few tangible ways to do so. Gift receivers can hold them in their hands, inspect them and store them for safekeeping on their own. This feature is a major advantage compared to other, more opaque gold types like stocks, futures and ETFs. While you can, theoretically, gift those other gold investment types, too, only gold bars and coins can provide the same experience as other, more conventional gift types.
It’s easy to buy
Gold bars and coins aren’t like other hot holiday gift ideas. They’re ubiquitous and easy to purchase both online and in person. Big retailers like Costco and Walmart sell them in their stores and on their websites (and some even sell silver, too). So if you’re worried about your ability to be able to secure this sort of gift, don’t be. That said, as the holidays get closer, it’s possible retailers could sell out of these items (as Costco has in the past). So don’t wait until Christmas Eve to act, either.
The bottom line
There are scarce gift options this year that will come with a rising value, tangible and visible benefits and an easy ability to be purchased by shoppers. But gold bars and coins offer all of those benefits right now. So if you want to add a shiny precious metal to your shopping list this holiday season, gold may be the best one to consider.
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Former cyber czar urges vigilance ahead of holiday season — “it’s not the attackers … it’s us”
Just a week before Thanksgiving, shoppers at Stop & Shop stores across Massachusetts were forced to leave empty-handed after a cyberattack against the supermarket chain’s parent company led to inventory shortages.
Parent company Ahold Delhaize said in a statement earlier this month, that it had alerted law enforcement about the cyber breach and had taken some systems offline. “While there may be some limited inventory for certain products, we are working to re-stock our shelves and anticipate item availability to continue to improve over the next few days,” the company said. But the incident may be a sign of things to come during the holiday season, when cybersecurity crises are likely to peak.
Already this year, corporate giants like AT&T, Ticketmaster and United Health have suffered paralyzing cyberattacks, and now, businesses are bracing for the holidays, a time when many cybersecurity operations rely on skeleton staffing. But the FBI and Department of Homeland Security are warning that it’s no time for them to be taking a “cyber vacation.”
The vast majority of ransomware attacks that hobbled businesses and organizations over the past year — 86% — occurred on a weekend or holiday, according to a new global study of 900 IT and security professionals released this week by cybersecurity firm Semperis. But researchers also found that 85% of surveyed organizations — 90% in the U.S. — reduce security staffing by as much as 50% during those same periods.
“This study would say that we’re not making thoughtful choices,” former White House “cyber czar” and Semperis strategic adviser Chris Inglis told CBS News. “If you realize that most of these attacks take place on holidays and weekends and you reduce your manning, you take away your opportunity to essentially have parity with your adversaries,” said Inglis. He added, “The advantage goes to the attacker, because they’re not taking a day off. They never take a day off.”
According to the report, organizations consistently overestimate their defenses, with 81% of respondents reporting that they believe they have the necessary expertise to safeguard their digital identities from threats. Still, 83% of participants suffered a successful ransomware attack within the past year.
Organizations are beginning to sense they’re more vulnerable around the holidays, but Inglis suggested consumers, too, need to be vigilant. Technologies like smart phones and tablets are now cheaper and nearly ubiquitous, but safety measures have not kept up.
“We’ve not actually made the necessary investments to make it such that these technologies — or this system of technologies — is defensible and well defended,” he said.
According to the survey, mergers, acquisitions, stock launches or layoffs also functioned as “magnets” for ransomware attacks, with a majority of respondents – 63% – also experiencing a cyber attack following what’s known as a “material corporate event.”
With financial executives predicting that President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the White House could usher in a wave of bank mergers and acquisitions, cybersecurity experts worry that cybercriminals will be able to take advantage of these “moments of distraction.”
“Our adversaries – be they criminal or foreign, rogue nations – they test the waters every day. They’re conscious of the fact that our attention waxes and wanes,” Inglis said. “If there’s a merger or an administration transition, those are moments of distraction. So we can expect that they will do what they always do. It’s not that they search at this moment, it’s that they see their opportunities being perhaps more productive at this moment.”
In February, UnitedHealth Group suffered the biggest hack in U.S. healthcare history after its acquisition of Change Healthcare meant it inherited outdated technology, with digital systems not yet safeguarded by multi-factor authentication.
Beyond an anticipated onslaught of big bank deals, changes in administration – regardless of politics – have historically enticed foreign adversaries to test the defenses of new leadership in Washington. In 2021, President Joe Biden inherited fallout from a sophisticated Russian cyberattack leveled against Texas software-maker SolarWinds and used to breach roughly 100 top U.S. companies and a dozen government agencies.
In June 2017, the Russian military waged the devastating ‘NotPetya’ cyber attack during Trump’s first year in office, unleashing a virus that crippled parts of Ukraine’s infrastructure and ravaged computer systems worldwide, amounting to billions in damages.
Security staffing also remains a widespread challenge across industries, with just 85% of organizations maintaining a year-round, 24-hour Security Operations Center, according to Semperis, and staffing challenges prompted by higher overtime costs when most employees are typically out of the office around the holidays.
Contributing to cybersecurity staffing headaches, cybersecurity workforce growth worldwide has flatlined for the first time since 2019. With growth of just 0.1% year-over-year in 2024, budget cuts, layoffs and hiring freezes have exacerbated a global staffing shortage of cybersecurity professionals, according to a recent report released by ISC2.
The former U.S. national cyber director said that he’s routinely asked what keeps him up at night. “It’s not the attackers, the Russians, the Chinese or any kind of ransomware actors. It’s us,” Inglis said. “Sometimes, it’s the complacency and the proactive ambivalence on our side that is actually, I think, more determinative of our future.”
