New Kansas abortion law is the first to ban common 'dismemberment' procedure
Kansas has become the first state in the nation to enact an abortion law that bans a common second-trimester procedure that abortion opponents call “dismemberment abortion.”
Gov. Sam Brownback signed the bill on Tuesday; the law is set to take effect on July 1, report the Associated Press and the New York Times. Similar bills have been introduced in Missouri, Oklahoma and South Carolina, according to AP.
The law bars the dilation and evacuation procedure unless it is needed to preserve a pregnant woman’s life or to prevent her serious and irreversible physical impairment. It defines (PDF) the banned procedure as “knowingly dismembering a living unborn child and extracting such unborn child one piece at a time from the uterus.”
Abortion rights supporters believe the law is subject to constitutional challenge. About 9 percent of abortions in Kansas last year used the procedure.
