INDIANAPOLIS — Doctors in Indiana would be required to tell women undergoing drug-induced abortions about a disputed treatment for potentially stopping the abortion process under a measure that’s been signed into law.
Republican Gov. Eric Holcomb signed the bill Thursday, two weeks after the GOP-dominated Legislature gave it final approval.
Republican lawmakers pushed the bill, despite objections that it would force doctors to provide dubious information to their patients. Supporters say the requirement would ensure that a woman can halt a medication-induced abortion if she changes her mind after taking the first of the two drugs used in the procedure and takes another drug instead.
The law is scheduled to take effect in July but could be challenged in federal court before then.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana, which has successfully sued to block several Indiana anti-abortion laws over the past decade, has said the requirement “runs afoul of the Constitution.”
Six states already have similar requirements in place, while such laws in North Dakota, Oklahoma and Tennessee have been blocked by legal challenges, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights.
