Gov. Ron DeSantis speaks against Florida’s abortion rights amendment during a press conference at the The Grove Bible Chapel in Winter Garden on Oct. 22, 2024. (Screenshot via Florida Channel)
Anti-abortion doctors have accompanied Gov. Ron DeSantis on a press tour this week against the amendment that would protect access to abortion in Florida’s Constitution.
The sponsor of Amendment 4, Floridians Protecting Freedom (FPF), itself flexed support from more than 850 doctors during a press call Tuesday afternoon.
“This endorsement stands in stark contrast to the state’s propaganda featuring a tour of anti-abortion doctors who support things like banning birth control and IVF, spreading misinformation about both Amendment 4 and Florida’s current abortion ban,” Yes on 4 campaign director Lauren Brenzel said during the call.
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Waiting for care
The pro-Amendment 4 letter the doctors signed states that infringements on access to abortion harm the health of Floridians. Doctors who signed the letter are identified by their first name initial, the first few letters of their last name, their specialty, and their city of practice.
Tampa OBGYN Samantha Baer said she had a patient who was denied care at an emergency room after her amniotic sac broke early.
“She waited a whole week for care, and then finally came to me. The patient had been excited to welcome a baby to her family, but the pregnancy now had no safe way of continuing,” Baer said. “Rather than be able to get care, grieve, and physically heal, she had to put her health at risk because the original ER felt they could not help her.”
Baer didn’t describe what treatment she provided.
One day after the six-week ban went into effect, the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration released a rule stating that circumstances such as ectopic pregnancies and the premature rupture of the amniotic sac don’t count as abortions.
The FPF letter echoes the experiences 25 Florida medical providers shared for a Physicians for Human Rights report. That report concluded that the state’s abortion restrictions have created an “unworkable legal landscape.”
Governor touts exceptions to Florida’s abortion restrictions
During DeSantis’ Tuesday appearances in Jacksonville and Winter Park churches, he said that physicians’ complaints that the abortion restrictions prevent them from providing medical care amount to malpractice.
“If you have somebody that is saying that they would be prohibited from providing any type of necessary health care, just understand they are lying to you,” DeSantis said during the campaign-like press conference at Sacred Heart Jacksonville Parrish Center. “And if they’re a physician, they are committing medical malpractice if that’s how they’re conducting themselves.”
State law provides for exemptions for rape, incest, or human trafficking, to save the life of the patient, and for fatal fetal abnormalities, but doctors and hospitals have been reluctant to observe them in practice for fear of sanctions including criminal prosecution and loss of licenses to practice. Procedural barriers also stand in the way, including a requirement to produce a police report or other evidence for patients to qualify for the exceptions for victims of crimes.
Brenzel called the governor’s comments “incredibly offensive,” considering that doctors who provide abortions outside of the state’s exceptions could lose their license, face up to five years in prison, and pay a $5,000 fine.
“We know that it is a very hard choice to provide quality medical care that is necessary or to risk being incarcerated under felony charges in order to provide that medical care. We are seeing the state ask doctors to make impossible choices right now,” Brenzel said.
Who are the anti-Amendment 4 doctors?
The doctors who joined DeSantis are part of Florida Physicians Against Amendment 4, which in press releases has boasted that more than 700 physicians have joined the coalition. However, the group is not releasing a list of those doctors to protect their privacy, a spokesperson told Florida Phoenix in a phone call.
“Amendment 4 is bad for women, it’s bad health care, it’s bad for children, it’s bad for families,” said Richard Sandler, a pediatric gastroenterologist who spoke at the event in Winter Park. “Now, we are physicians, not politicians or not PR people, so being here is kind of uncomfortable. It is way out of our zone that we do every day that we train for, but we have to stand up because this is too important.”
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