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MEDICAL ETHICS Physician Sees a Threat to Abortion Rights LeRoy Carhart, one of only three doctors in Nebraska known to perform abortions, initiated a challenge to the state's 1997 ban on "partial-birth abortions," and that challenge was supported this past June by the U.S. Supreme Court. The new precedent could affect policies in the 30 other states that have similar bans. LeRoy Carhart shares the floor during a question and answer session following his lecture, "'Partial-Birth' Abortion, the Supreme Court, and Physician Autonomy." —Liza Green, HMS Media Services On Oct. 10, Carhart, who is medical director of the Abortion and Contraception Clinic of Nebraska, spoke at HMS about "'Partial-Birth Abortion,' the Supreme Court, and Physician Autonomy" in the annual Lawrence Lader Lecture on Family Planning and Reproductive Rights, sponsored by the HMS Division of Medical Ethics and Medical Students for Choice. "The way the law was presented in Nebraska, most of us thought, 'We don't care; we don't do abortions this way,'" Carhart said. But the actual wording of the law concerned him. It said that one "cannot intentionally remove any part of the fetus through the vagina with the intent to kill it." That description would apply to more than just the controversial dilation and extraction, or D and X, procedure, so Carhart questioned the scope of the ban. He also mentioned that "partial-birth abortion" is not a recognized medical term. When Carhart asked the legislator who had authored the original bill if he would rewrite the law to explicitly ban the D and X procedure, he refused to do so. Since Nebraska already had a late-term, or post-viability, abortion ban in place, Carhart and others believe that the non-medical term was an intentional ploy to obfuscate an attempt to ban all abortions. After lower courts sided with Carhart and found the law unconstitutional, Nebraska brought the case to the Supreme Court, hoping it would overturn the previous rulings and uphold the ban. This summer, the court denied the law by a 5 to 4 vote, saying it "violates the Federal Constitution, as interpreted in Casey and Roe." Although pleased with the verdict, Carhart told his audience, "The slim margin means if the next president appoints one against, we could lose a lot." A surgeon by training, Carhart began helping at a local abortion clinic in Omaha and eventually opened a clinic of his own. He is currently the only physician in Nebraska who performs abortions after 16 weeks gestation. —Tracy Hampton