H.B. 5148, An Act Concerning Pregnant Patients Exercising Living Wills

Currently, Connecticut law completely disregards the expressed advanced directive wishes of pregnant people. Under current Connecticut law, a pregnant person’s health care wishes are automatically nullified if they are pregnant, meaning they will be forced to receive medical life-sustaining treatment when they are permanently unconscious, incapacitated, or terminally ill, despite contrary instructions in their advance directive or their past statements regarding their wishes. The government should not direct physicians to disregard the health care wishes of pregnant people simply because they are pregnant. The ACLU of Connecticut supports this bill, which would repeal Connecticut’s pregnancy exception for advance directives and allow people to specify in their advance directives what they would like to do if they are pregnant.