The Arizona Supreme Court on Tuesday issued a decision upholding a 160-year-old law that bans abortion in nearly all circumstances.
“In light of this Opinion, physicians are now on notice that all abortions, except those necessary to save a woman’s life, are illegal … and that additional criminal and regulatory sanctions may apply to abortions performed after fifteen weeks’ gestation,” the court wrote in its opinion.
The law, which was enacted as early as 1864, gives abortion providers a two- to five-year prison sentence, and it does not include exceptions for rape or incest. Arizona became a state in 1912.
