Utah House panel OKs bill barring remote abortion pill dispensing

A committee of Utah lawmakers has approved a bill that bars doctors from telemedicine to remotely prescribe abortion-inducing medication.

The Republican-dominated House Public Utilities, Energy, and Technology Standing Committee passed the bill Monday afternoon, sending it to the full House for a debate. The proposal is likely to pass Utah’s Legislature, where the GOP has a supermajority and many of its members oppose abortion rights.

Democratic lawmakers and other critics Monday said the proposal would hurt rural women’s access to abortions and singles out abortion as the only medical procedure in which doctors would not be able to remotely prescribe a medication.

Idaho passed similar measures in 2015. A federal judge says he will declare those laws unconstitutional if lawmakers don’t repeal them by the end of 2017.