'Shameful, 'egregious': Medical groups react to Roe v Wade overturn

The American Medical Association and National Nurses United were among medical associations that strongly condemned the Supreme Court's June 24 strikedown of the constitutional right to abortion. 

The 6-3 decision leaves abortion legality up to individual states. Nearly half of states are expected to ban or restrict abortion as a result of the ruling. 

"The American Medical Association is deeply disturbed by the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to overturn nearly a half century of precedent protecting patients' right to critical reproductive healthcare — representing an egregious allowance of government intrusion into the medical examination room, a direct attack on the practice of medicine and the patient-physician relationship, and a brazen violation of patients' rights to evidence-based reproductive health services," AMA President Jack Resneck Jr., MD, said in a statement. "States that end legal abortion will not end abortion — they will end safe abortion, risking devastating consequences, including patients' lives." 

National Nurses United echoed the same message, calling the ruling a "shameful and dangerous assault on women, other child-bearing people and families at a sweeping scale." 

Both of the groups said the decision will worsen existing inequities in healthcare by limiting access to reproductive care to those with the financial means and other resources to do so. 

"This denial of healthcare will most violently harm and deepen existing inequalities for low-income people and people who already suffer from lack of and inadequate healthcare, such as Black, LatinX, and immigrant women," NNU said in its statement. 

Ahead of the ruling, physicians referenced the need for clinics and other facilities that offer services in states where access to abortion remains protected to prepare for increased demand in anticipation that more patients will cross state lines to seek the procedure. 

To read the AMA's full statement, click here

To read NNU's full statement, click here

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