NASHVILLE — A Tennessee House effort to change the state’s abortion ban to create an exception in cases where a physician deemed it necessary to prevent the death of a pregnant woman or prevent serious and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function was left in limbo Wednesday in committee.
House Health Committee members adjourned before taking up the planned new amendment to the bill sponsored by Rep. Esther Helton-Haynes, R-East Ridge, with the active support of House Speaker Cameron Sexton, R-Crossville.
The new amendment seeks to change language that originally left the decision to perform an abortion to the “good faith judgment” of the physician. It would now require a physician’s “reasonable medical judgment,” a tougher standard involving other providers.
That left both physicians and Democrats objecting later.
The Republican-led panel spent most of its time Wednesday in a hearing with the state’s new health commissioner, Ralph Alvarado. Following that, Health Committee Chairman Rep. Bryan Terry, R-Murfreesboro, declared the panel was out of time. The committee then adjourned with Helton-Haynes’ House Bill 883 not acted on.