"Today’s decision is not a victory for pregnant patients in Idaho," Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson declared on Thursday. "It is delay."
In her dissent on Moyle v. the United States, Brown Jackson highlighted the only takeaway journalists and voters should get from this case about whether Idaho can force emergency room doctors to turn away pregnant patients in crisis. During oral arguments in April, it became clear that the conservative justices do not care if women experiencing a failing pregnancy are denied care, which could result in permanent injuries or even death. Justice Samuel Alito even took time to gripe that the federal law requiring emergency rooms to provide stabilizing care did not use the phrase "unborn child." He got annoyed when Justice Sonia Sotomayor mentioned the actual living people being airlifted out of Idaho so doctors in nearby states could help. Physicians for Human Rights documented some of the conditions women who are denied this treatment can experience: "stroke, seizure, liver damage, kidney failure, bleeding, complications," as well as "septic shock," which can lead to the loss of the uterus or even death.
