Gov. Maura Healey signed a Massachusetts bill on Monday that removes the state's gestational limits on abortion, opening the door to the procedure up to birth under the new Massachusetts abortion law. The measure, called the Prioritizing Patient Access to Care Act, is set to take effect in 90 days.
The change ends a long-standing rule that generally prohibited abortions after 24 weeks, with limited exceptions. For families facing serious complications late in pregnancy, Healey said the new law is meant to let them make decisions in Massachusetts rather than travel out of state, and to give health care workers more room to decide whether a later abortion is medically appropriate without facing penalties under the old restrictions.
Healey cast the law as a matter of patient choice, not politics. “We believe that health care decisions should be made between women and families and their doctors, not politicians,” she said, adding that abortion will remain “safe, legal and accessible” in Massachusetts.
That message also carried a sharper edge. Healey said, “I stand with women. My opponents do not,” and framed the bill as a response to national efforts under President Donald Trump and Republicans to roll back abortion protections after Roe v. Wade was overturned by the Supreme Court. In her telling, Massachusetts is not simply preserving access; it is planting a flag in a broader fight over who gets to set the rules.
The law places Massachusetts alongside Alaska, Colorado, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon and Vermont, plus the District of Columbia, in removing gestational age limits. That makes the state one of 11 states and the District of Columbia to do so, a shift with immediate consequences once the 90-day clock runs out. What remains unclear is how doctors will exercise that new discretion in later-pregnancy cases when the law takes effect.
