The Oklahoma Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday that two state laws banning abortion are unconstitutional, but the procedure in the state remains illegal in nearly all cases except in life-threatening situations.

In a 6-3 ruling, the Supreme Court said the two bans are unconstitutional because they require a medical emergency before a doctor can perform an abortion. The court said this language violates an earlier ruling it issued in March, which ruled that the Oklahoma constitution gives a pregnant woman the inherent right to terminate a pregnancy when necessary to preserve her life. retain.

The court’s decision was welcomed by doctors who said uncertainty about the state’s abortion laws often forced them to let women with serious medical complications and nonviable pregnancies wait until their condition worsened before performing an abortion.

In our practice, we had cases where we just had to tell women to whom we normally give a [pregnancy] termination to protect her health,… We need to let you go home and monitor your condition and if you start to show signs of infection or worsening blood pressure come back and we have the option to treat you legally, said Dana Stone, an Oklahoma City obstetrician and gynecologist. Otherwise, with these laws, we risk going to prison for ten years, getting hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines, and losing our medical licenses.

Despite the court’s decision in March that the requirement to wait until an active medical emergency violated the state constitution, uncertainty remained due to the two laws remaining in effect.

With their decision today, the court has ensured that the March decision will be fully implemented, said Rabia Muqaddam, a senior staff attorney at the New York-based Center for Reproductive Rights, who was challenging the laws on behalf of an abortion provider in Tulsa. Hopefully, patients will get the medically necessary care they need without waiting to die.

Since the US Supreme Court’s Dobbs ruling last year in which Roe v. Wade and nationwide abortion rights were overturned, stricter abortion restrictions have been introduced in most Republican-controlled states, and abortion access protections have been enacted in most of the majority dominated by Democrats.

The laws struck down in Oklahoma on Wednesday both included a civil enforcement mechanism, first going into effect in Texas in 2021, that allowed citizens to sue anyone who performed or assisted an abortion.

Despite court rulings today on SB 1503 and HB 4327, Oklahoma’s 1910 law prohibiting abortion remains in effect,” Oklahoma Atty said. Gene. Gentner Drummond in a statement. state of Oklahoma.

The 1910 Oklahoma law makes it a felony punishable by up to five years in prison for anyone who performs an abortion or assists a woman to have an abortion, unless it is necessary to preserve her life.

The court’s decision was disapproved of by Republican leaders, including Gov. Kevin Stitt, who has worked for years to severely restrict access to abortion in Oklahoma.

This court has again become too preoccupied with the state’s democratic process and has mediated to overturn legislation created by the will of the people,” Stitt said in a statement.” I agree with justice [Dustin] Rowes disagrees, the issues raised in this issue are political issues, better resolved by the people through our democratic process.