title: Fetal pain, abortion, viability, and the Constitution.
abstract: In early 2010, the Nebraska state legislature passed a new abortion restricting law asserting a new, compelling state interest in preventing fetal pain. In this article, we review existing constitutional abortion doctrine and note difficulties presented by persistent legal attention to a socially derived viability construct. We then offer a substantive biological, ethical, and legal critique of the new fetal pain rationale.
authors.affiliation: Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics, Harvard Law School, MA, USA.
authors.forename: I Glenn
authors.initials: IG
authors.lastname: Cohen
authors.forename: Sadath
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Sayeed
mesh_terms: D000028:Abortion, Induced / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D005260:Female; D005328:Fetal Viability; D005333:Fetus / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D009329:Nebraska; D010146:Pain; D011247:Pregnancy; D035521:Supreme Court Decisions; D014481:United States