Illinois
Ranking: 36
After more than 15 years of legal wrangling, it appeared in 2009 that Illinois’ parental notice law might finally go into effect. However, the ACLU filed yet another legal challenge to the law, and, at the end of 2012, the “Illinois Parental Notice of Abortion Act” remained enjoined, pending an appeal to the state supreme court.
Abortion:
- Illinois’ law prohibiting a physician from performing an abortion on a minor under the age of 18 without providing 48 hours’ notice to one parent or other adult family member is enjoined pending the outcome of ongoing state litigation. The law provides exceptions in cases of rape, incest, child abuse by an adult family member, or in a medical emergency, and permits a minor to seek a court order to bypass the notice requirement.
- Illinois’ abortion clinic regulations are not uniformly applied to all of the state’s abortion clinics.
- Only physicians licensed by the state of Illinois may perform abortions. A chiropractor’s 1978 challenge this requirement was rejected.
- Illinois has an enforceable abortion reporting law, but does not require the reporting of information to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). The measure requires abortion providers to report short-term complications.
- Illinois requires abortion and contraception providers, as well as those who provide referrals for these services, to report suspected child abuse or neglect.
- Illinois taxpayers are required by court order to fund “medically necessary” abortions for women eligible for public assistance. This requirement essentially equates to funding abortion-on-demand in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s broad definition of “health” in the context of abortion.
- State Department of Children and Family Services grants may be made to non-profit agencies and organizations which do not use such grants to refer for, counsel for, or perform abortions.
- In the state health plan, Illinois provides abortion coverage only when a woman’s life is endangered.
- Health insurance plans that provide prescription coverage must also provide coverage for contraception. An exemption is provided for religious employers.
- Illinois requires that emergency rooms provide information on “emergency contraception” to sexual assault victims.
- Under Illinois criminal law, the killing of an unborn child at any stage of gestation is defined as a form of homicide.
- Illinois defines a nonfatal assault on an unborn child as a crime.
- Illinois allows a wrongful death (civil) action when an unborn child at any stage of development is killed through a third-party’s negligent or criminal act.
- The state has created a specific affirmative duty of physicians to provide medical care and treatment to infants born alive at any stage of development.
- Illinois maintains an “Abandoned Newborn Infant Protection Act,” or “Baby Moses” law, which includes a prohibition preventing persons accepting an infant under the Act from publicly discussing the circumstances surrounding the infant’s legal surrender.
- The state defines substance abuse during pregnancy as “child abuse” under civil child-welfare statutes. Illinois requires healthcare professionals to report suspected prenatal drug exposure and funds drug treatment programs for pregnant women and newborns.
- Under the “Stem Cell Research and Human Cloning Prohibition Act,” Illinois permits and funds destructive embryo research. While the Act prohibits cloning-to-produce-children, it specifically allows for “therapeutic cloning”—thus making Illinois a “clone-and-kill” state.
- The state Department of Public Health has been directed to establish a network of human cord blood banks. The Department also encourages healthcare providers to distribute its publication on umbilical cord blood banking, and all licensed hospitals are to offer pregnant patients the option to donate cord blood.
- Illinois does not regulate human egg harvesting and provides no meaningful regulation of assisted reproductive technologies. It permits gestational surrogacy.
- In Illinois, assisted suicide is a felony.
- Illinois maintains a Physicians Order for Life-Sustaining Treatment (POLST) Paradigm Program.
- By statute, Illinois protects the civil rights of all healthcare providers, whether individuals, institutions, or payers (public or private), who conscientiously object to participating in any healthcare services, including abortion. The law includes protection for medical and nursing students, counselors, and social workers.
- By statute, Illinois protects the civil rights of all healthcare providers who conscientiously object to participating in procedures such as human cloning and destructive embryo research.
- In Morr-Fitz v. Quinn, the Illinois Attorney General declined to appeal a lower court ruling invalidating the application of an administrative rule imposed by former Governor Rod Blagojevich and mandating that pharmacists dispense contraception including so-called “emergency contraception” “without delay.” In June 2005, AUL attorneys filed this legal challenge to the coercive mandate, alleging that it violated both federal and state law protecting healthcare freedom of conscience.
- In Hope Clinic for Women v. Adams, the Illinois Supreme Court heard a challenge to state’s parental notice law.
- Illinois considered legislation related to informed consent, an ultrasound requirement, abortion clinic regulations, and “Choose Life” license plates.
- On the bioethics front, Illinois considered legislation funding unethical forms of research. Conversely, the state considered legislation regulating human egg harvesting. The state also considered legislation related to the parentage and inheritance rights of children conceived using assisted reproductive technologies.
- Abortion Mandate Opt-Out Act
- Defunding the Abortion Industry and Advancing Women’s Health Act
- Women’s Health Protection Act (abortion clinic regulations)
- Women’s Ultrasound Right to Know Act
- Abortion-Inducing Drugs Safety Act
- Coercive Abuse Against Mothers Prevention Act
- Abortion Complication Reporting Act
- Joint Resolution Commending Pregnancy Care Centers
- Pregnant Woman’s Protection Act
- Human Cloning Prohibition Act
- Destructive Embryo Research Act
- Prohibition on Public Funding of Human Cloning and Destructive Embryo Research Act
- Repeal of 2005 Executive Order requiring pharmacists to dispense “emergency contraception” without “delay.”
