Ohio Academy of Family Physicians President Anna McMaster, MD, and OAFP Public Policy Chair Sarah Sams, MD, wrote to members of the Ohio House Criminal Justice Committee on February 26 expressing OAFP’s strong opposition to House Bill (HB) 413, a bill that makes failure to transplant an ectopic pregnancy a felony offense.
The letter explains that current science does not make transplantation of an ectopic pregnancy possible. The attempt to try to remove a developing pregnancy from its implantation site would be so disruptive that the pregnancy could not continue to develop. Furthermore, the endometrial lining of the uterus is only receptive to implantation for a few days after ovulation. In short, the bill subjects physicians to a criminal felony penalty with death penalty specifications for failure to do something that is not medically possible to do.
In their letter addressed to House Criminal Justice Committee Chair George Lang (R-West Chester, OH), Drs. McMaster and Sams stated, “There have been harmful repercussions to the mere introduction of this bill as some women who have experienced an ectopic pregnancy are angry with their physician because they think the physician failed to offer them this nonexistent medical option. The misinformation caused by this bill’s introduction has re-traumatized women who have already been devastated by an ectopic pregnancy. In turn, this misinformation, in some cases, has caused significant harm to the important relationship between patient and physician.”
“Ectopic pregnancy is the number one cause of maternal mortality in the first trimester of pregnancy. This bill, if passed, would endanger the lives of women who need timely treatment of an ectopic pregnancy and would criminalize the practice of medicine.”
The letter concluded, “Please don’t let this bill pass out of committee.”
Legislators advocating for unproven medical treatments is becoming more and more prevalent in today’s Ohio General Assembly. The OAFP continues to call out these efforts as inappropriate attempts to criminalize the practice of medicine and as unwarranted legislative interference into the practice of medicine.