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Abortion providers and the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit against the state on Tuesday in a bid to overturn a longstanding rule limiting low-income women’s access to a state-funded abortion. It’s buried in a set of rules developed in 1981 and last revised in 2010, before Gov. Paul LePage took office. However, it could set up a politically charged court fight with the anti-abortion Republican, whose spokeswoman called the lawsuit “little more than a frivolous public relations stunt.” (Shepherd, 11/24)

The American Civil Liberties Union of Maine has filed a lawsuit seeking to force MaineCare to provide funding for abortions. The group filed the lawsuit on Tuesday in Cumberland County Superior Court and says that depriving women of abortion coverage violates the state's constitution. The lawsuit is filed on behalf of three women's health care providers against the Maine Department of Health and Human Services. (11/24)

A Planned Parenthood clinic in Columbia has stopped performing abortions, leaving only one clinic in the state still offering them. The clinic on Monday stopped offering non-surgical abortions, which are induced with a pill, because a clinic doctor was set to lose a crucial hospital privilege on Dec. 1. State law requires physicians or centers providing abortions to have certain agreements with local hospitals for patient care, although lawmakers and health department officials are at odds over what specific privileges meet that requirement. (11/24)

Federal health officials aim to release their findings on a much-debated contraceptive implant by the end of February. The Food and Drug Administration posted a brief statement online about its review of the metallic device, Essure, which has been subject to thousands of complaints by women reporting chronic pain, bleeding and headaches. (Perrone, 11/24)