LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — Last week the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, which has put Arkansas's trigger law into effect, that has banned nearly all abortions statewide, except for in a scenario where a mother's life needs to be saved in the event of a medical emergency.
But that has left lots of people to ask, what situations are considered medical emergencies?
At the law's certification last week, Attorney General Leslie Rutledge explained, "I'm gonna say this as clearly as I know how and as clearly as the law states, the only time that an abortion is legal in Arkansas is to save the life of the mother."
As the law was read line by line, it stated that an ectopic pregnancy, which is extremely high-risk, can legally be removed at any time. This is because the law doesn't technically consider that procedure to be an abortion, so it's safe for someone to go to the hospital for that treatment.
In fact, the new laws might not have too much of an impact on some Arkansas doctors' jobs.
Baptist Health shared in a statement on Monday, "We always abide by Federal and State laws and the new decisions will not change our practice. Baptist Health does not perform abortions, with the limited exception of life-threatening medical circumstances which require therapeutic intervention consistent with current state law. "
UALR Bowen Law School professor Robert Steinbuch said that being able to define what those 'life saving medical circumstances" are, could be a little more difficult.
"Whenever you have a new law, with new language, we can all read it ourselves and we can all make our own interpretation. But there's only one body that determines whether or not you go to jail, and that's a court," he said.
Because the law has only recently begun to take effect, courts haven't made decisions on specific procedural debates just yet.
Steinbuch said that the gray area that has been left, is something that can happen with any new law. The only way to have more clarity would be to ask, "Is someone going to try to provide abortion services to a woman in an instance in which there will be a debate as to whether the life of the mother was an issue?"
Steinbuch also added that the reason the blind spots seem so much bigger than other new laws with their own gray areas, is the size of the impact.
"If we had a new law on, you know, what your catalytic converter on your automobile must have, we might not know exactly what it means, but it wouldn't nearly be the issue... as we're dealing with in this situation," Steinbuch compared.
The bottom line is as the law has been written, ectopic pregnancies can still safely be removed in the state of Arkansas.
Courts will have to figure out the specifics of this law moving forward. But currently doctors like those at Baptist Health, will continue to provide the life-saving care that they've said they have always given.