{"data":{"id":"us-ky/krs-311.7811","jurisdiction":"us-ky","citation":"KRS 311.7811","heading":"Legislative findings and declarations.","body":"The  General Assembly finds and declares, according to contemporary medical\nresearch, all of the following:\n(1) Medical  and  other authorities now  know  more  about human  prenatal\ndevelopment than ever before, including:\n(a) Between  five (5) and six (6) weeks' gestation, an unborn child's heart\nbegins beating;\n(b) At approximately eight (8) weeks' gestation, an unborn child begins to\nmove  about in the womb;\n(c) At nine (9) weeks' gestation, all basic physiological functions are present,\nincluding teeth, eyes, and external genitalia;\n(d) At ten (10) weeks' gestation, an unborn child's vital organs begin to\nfunction, and hair, fingernails, and toenails begin to form;\n(e) At  eleven (11) weeks' gestation, an  unborn  child's diaphragm  is\ndeveloping, he or she may even hiccup, and he or she is beginning to\nmove  about freely in the womb; and\n(f) At twelve (12) weeks' gestation, an unborn child can open and close his\nor her fingers, starts to make  sucking motions, senses stimulation from\nthe world outside the womb, and has taken on \"the human  form\" in all\nrelevant aspects under Gonzales v. Carhart, 550 U.S. 124, 160 (2007);\n(2) The  United States Supreme  Court has long recognized that the state has an\n\"important and legitimate interest in protecting the potentiality of human  life,\"\nRoe  v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113, 162 (1973), and specifically that \"the state has an\ninterest in protecting the life of the unborn,\" Planned  Parenthood  of\nSoutheastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833, 873 (1992);\n(3) The  majority of abortion procedures performed after fifteen (15) weeks'\ngestation are dilation and evacuation procedures which involve the use of\nsurgical instruments to crush and tear the unborn child apart before removing\nthe pieces of the dead child from the womb, procedures prohibited under KRS\n311.787, and the General Assembly finds that the intentional commitment of\nsuch  acts for nontherapeutic or elective reasons is a barbaric practice,\ndangerous for the maternal patient, and demeaning to the medical profession;\n(4) Abortion carries significant physical and psychological risks to the maternal\npatient, and these physical and psychological risks increase with gestational\nage;\n(5) As  the second trimester progresses, in the vast majority of uncomplicated\npregnancies, the maternal health risks of undergoing an abortion are greater\nthan the risks of carrying a pregnancy to term;\n(6) Seventy-five percent (75%) of all the nations in the world do not permit abortion\nafter twelve (12) weeks' gestation except, in most instances, to save the life\nand preserve the physical health of the mother; and\n(7) The Commonwealth  of Kentucky has legitimate interests from the outset of the\npregnancy in protecting both the health of the woman  and the life of an unborn\nhuman  individual who may be born.","path":["KRS Chapter 311"],"source_url":"https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=52244","current_through":"Includes enactments through the 2026 Regular Session","vintage":"09/05/2026","retrieved_at":"2026-09-05T20:58:06Z","sha256":"928720f1c9505744e39058d9864eafcbe09b5bfa63517cb6d3306ecea7d50c5c","source_id":"us-ky","stale":false,"prev":"us-ky/krs-311.781","next":"us-ky/krs-311.782"},"notice":"GroundRules: Original legal text. Not legal advice."}