SEATTLE — A Mount Vernon woman wants her local hospital to provide full abortion services as required by Washington state law.
And now American Civil Liberties Union is backing her up with a lawsuit.
Kevan Coffey worked two years as a licensed nurse practitioner at Skagit Valley Hospital.
And she has personal reasons for joining the ACLU's lawsuit demanding full abortion services be available there.
“I need access to abortion services. I'm currently taking a medication called Accutane that causes severe birth defects, so should I become pregnant, I would need to seek abortion," Coffey told reporters at ACLU headquarters in Seattle.
The ACLU says Skagit Valley is one of a number of taxpayer-owned hospitals in Washington that are not in compliance with Reproductive Privacy Act passed by voters in 1991. It requires that hospitals offering maternity services, also offer full abortion services.
“I referred my patients who were seeking abortion services to Planned Parenthood,” Coffey said. “It was an unwritten policy at Skagit that that's what we should do with those patients,” she said.
But the hospital’s chief medical officer says the hospital is indeed following the law.
“We have no policy against termination,” Dr. Connie Davis said in response to reporter’s questions. She said there was no policy against abortions at Skagit Valley Hospital, formal or informal.
However, Dr. Davis says the hospital does not keep records on the number of abortions performed on site.
The ACLU believes there are many other public hospitals not living up to the abortion services requirement.
“You don't get to choose and say I'm not going to serve you because there's something about you that I don't like. And in this case it's something about the services you happen to choose,” said ACLU Executive Director Kathleen Taylor.
KIRO
