Health Care — Georgia court reinstates six-week abortion ban

It was a mixed day for abortion rights advocates. We’ll look at the details. Plus: Why the COVID-19 pandemic saw a significant drop-off in worldwide measles vaccinations for children.

Welcome to Overnight Health Care, where we’re following the latest moves on policy and news affecting your health. For The Hill, we’re Nathaniel Weixel and Joseph Choi. Someone forward you this newsletter? 

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Georgia’s highest court OKs six-week abortion ban

Georgia’s state Supreme Court on Wednesday reinstated the state’s ban on abortions after roughly six weeks of pregnancy. 

The court granted the state’s emergency petition, and pauses a lower court ruling from last week where a judge called the ban “unconstitutional.” 

Reproductive rights groups had argued the state’s abortion ban violates the state’s constitution.  

They won a decision from the Superior Court of Fulton County, where Judge Robert McBurney ruled earlier this month that the ban was invalid. 

According to the ACLU, patients who had scheduled abortion appointments last week are being turned away. 

• Georgia’s Living Infants Fairness and Equality (LIFE) Act, passed in 2019, would ban abortions in the state after a fetal heartbeat is detected, usually around six weeks of pregnancy.  
• After the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June, a complex patchwork of state laws emerged with conservative states, particularly in the South and Midwest, moving swiftly to impose new abortion restrictions and even near-total bans.  

Many people do not yet know they are pregnant at six weeks, which is the earliest that fetal cardiac electrical activity can be detected. The electrical activity is not the same as a heartbeat, though the legislation is often called a “heartbeat law.”  

Read more here.

Kansas court allows telemedicine for abortion pills 

A Kansas state court blocked a 2011 law that prohibited doctors from providing medication abortion via telemedicine. 

Shawnee County District Court Judge Teresa Watson granted a temporary injunction barring the enforcement of a state law that requires physicians to administer abortion-inducing drugs while they are in the room with the patient. 

Still, the Kansas Supreme Court may ultimately weigh in before telemedicine abortions are allowed to resume. 

• Since the Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade in June, women have increasingly turned…