SPRINGFIELD – To protect women across Illinois’ access to healthcare, Senate Majority Leader Kimberly A. Lightford (D-Maywood) supported a measure that passed the Senate.

“Women across the country are living in fear that their rights to reproductive healthcare will be stripped away,” Lightford said. “As for Illinois, we are standing up to protect our women and families at a time when the White House has no interest in the wellbeing of women.”

The Reproductive Health Act does the following:

• restricts the State’s ability to deny a person’s reproductive healthcare decision,
• repeals felony and disciplinary penalties imposed on doctors offering abortions,
• prohibits a husband from obtaining an injunction to prevent his wife from having an abortion,
• permits burial or cremation after a miscarriage or abortion, and
• requires insurance companies to cover abortions.

Senate Bill 25 was drafted in response to 20 cases awaiting a hearing before the Supreme Court that aim to weaken or overrule Roe v. Wade. Those cases could be heard during the court’s next term, which begins on October 7.