Abortion clinic closes under pressure of investigation

Jun 15, 2006 / 22:00 pm

A Birmingham abortion clinic, which was under investigation for the mistreatment of a customer and could have faced criminal charges, has surrendered its license reported The Associated Press.

The Summit Medical Center surrendered its license June14 amid allegations that a woman delivered a nearly full-term stillborn baby after a nurse practitioner gave her abortion drug RU-486 and performed other medical treatments without a doctor present, health officials said Wednesday.

The Alabama Department of Health had issued a suspension order against Summit Medical Center on May 17, citing numerous violations of state health rules. The center has been closed since May 18 and will not reopen, Rick Harris of the state health agency told the AP.

However, the clinic’s decision to voluntarily surrender its license circumvents a public hearing on June 20 in which the state would have presented its case against the center and sought to revoke its license.

"We got the same remedy we were trying to get in the hearing," Harris said according to the AP.
 
Pro-life activists consider Summit’s surrender of their license an attempt to conceal the actions of the clinic.

“The last thing an abortion mill wants is for the truth to be told about the conditions that really exist inside their offices,” noted Operation Rescue president Troy Newman. “These mills would rather close than submit to the same standards legitimate medical providers must meet. And frankly, if they close, that’s fine with us.”