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Boston's Morning Newsletter
Lawsuit alleges Worcester's Clearway Clinic misled woman about unviable pregnancy
Editor's Note: This is an excerpt from WBUR's daily morning newsletter, WBUR Today. If you like what you read and want it in your inbox, sign up here.
Tomorrow marks one year since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, which overturned the federal right to an abortion. We have two Cognoscenti essays out this morning — one from local OB/GYN Charlotte Lee and another from Brandeis anthropology professor Anita Hannig — reflecting on the moment.
Keep an eye on wbur.org for more coverage today on how Massachusetts is feeling the effects of Dobbs a year later. But first, a new local story tied to the roiling abortion debate:
A Worcester crisis pregnancy center is promising to continue its work, despite a lawsuit alleging it did not tell a woman she had a dangerous, unviable pregnancy. WBUR’s Deborah Becker reports that the lawsuit alleges Clearway Clinic told the patient her pregnancy was healthy after performing an ultrasound last fall. But a month later, she required emergency surgery because the fetus was growing outside the uterus. Her attorneys say if she had been properly diagnosed, the surgery and removal of one of her fallopian tubes could have been avoided.
- The response: Jill Jorgensen, the executive director of Clearway, said the clinic has “never had a complaint like this in the past,” but declined to address individual claims due to HIPAA rules.
- Zoom out: The suit also accuses Clearway of luring women into the clinic for pregnancy care with a goal of preventing abortions. NPR recently reported crisis pregnancy centers often top Google results when patients search for abortion clinics.
- Go deeper: Becker has more here on the debate over crisis pregnancy centers in the post-Dobbs world.
The Mass. Pike is getting a bit of a reboot. All six of the public electric vehicle chargers on the Mass. Pike have been taken permanently out of service, as the state works to find a company to install more reliable ones. MassDOT is soliciting bids from companies to remove and install new, faster-charging stations at the Pike’s rest stops in Lee, Natick, Charlton and Framingham through the end of June.
- What’s next: It’s unclear when the new chargers will be installed, but The Boston Globe reports it’s expected to be a bit of a wait. Under the climate law passed last summer, the state is also required to have a plan to install chargers at the Pike’s rest stops Ludlow, Blandford and Westborough by next July.
- The big picture: The state’s fledgling efforts to build out a network of public EV chargers is crucial to address “range anxiety,” one of the most common worries among prospective EV buyers.
- Where they are now: Check out this map from PlugShare for a view of all public EV chargers in Massachusetts.
There’s a new plaque in Boston’s South End honoring the apartment where Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King once lived. It’s located in the Southwest Corridor Park near the Orange Line’s Mass. Ave station. You can see more photos of the monument here.
- The civil rights activists, who met in Boston during college, lived in the fifth floor of a six-story building at 396 North Hampton St. (The apartment was later torn down to make way for the park.)
After a Green Line train derailed at Packard’s Corner last week, the MBTA is moving up plans to upgrade the stretch’s tracks — and that means a big diversion next month. T officials say they will close the Green Line’s entire B branch for 12 days — from July 17 to July 28. The Boston Globe reports it will be the first major track upgrade for the tricky turn since 2002.
- Shuttle buses will sub in between Kenmore and Boston College during the closure. There will also be lane closures and detours for vehicle traffic in both directions through Packard’s Corner.
- But first: There’s one more closure this weekend of the entire Green Line Extension so crews can work on the Lechmere Viaduct, which has long been hampered by 10 mph slow zones. Shuttle buses swap in for all service north of Government Center.
Boston’s Open Streets program is making its return this weekend in Jamaica Plain. A stretch of Centre Street — from Jackson Square to South Street — will be blocked off to cars on Sunday from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. to make way for shopping, food vendors and games.
- What’s next: There are more Open Streets days scheduled this year in Roxbury, Allston/Brighton, Dorchester and East Boston. Check out the full schedule here.
P.S.— What Massachusetts city was named by Fortune as the best place for families to live in the U.S.? Test your knowledge of the stories we covered this week and take our Boston News Quiz.
