Ultrasound Mandate Dropped from Indiana Abortion Bill

Indiana lawmakers are dropping a proposal requiring that clinics offering the abortion pill perform ultrasounds on women seeking the drug.

A House committee removed that provision Wednesday from a broader bill that would force clinics that provide only drug-induced abortions to meet the same facility requirements as clinics that perform surgical abortions. The committee voted 8-5 to advance the bill to the full House.

Planned Parenthood calls those facility requirements unnecessary and says they could force it to stop providing the abortion pill at its Lafayette clinic.

Indiana Right to Life president Mike Fichter says the group agreed with the decision to drop the ultrasound requirement because debate over it in the state Senate had taken focus away from its goal of tightening regulations on clinics that provide abortions.