Pro-choice advocates (right) and anti-abortion advocates (left) rally outside of the Supreme Court. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Women travel from across the country for late-term abortion procedures at a clinic in Germantown, Maryland, one of few providers in the country that offer the service.

Now, though, a group that has been trying for years to shut down Germantown Reproductive Health Services is slated to purchase the facility, reports The Washington Post.

“It’s a miracle. You fight for something for seven years, and all of a sudden it’s handed to you,” Dennis Donnelly, media director for The Maryland Coalition for Life, told The Post. He said that a donor gave money this summer, and the group raised additional funds, to be able to buy out the clinic.

The grassroots coalition of anti-choice advocates has been particularly vocal in their opposition to Dr. LeRoy Carhart, a doctor who has performed late-term abortions in Germantown since 2010.

It’s not the only clinic closure for Maryland. Prince George’s Reproductive Health Services, which has the same owner as the Germantown facility, is also shuttering.

“Although the announcement of the closing of the Prince George’s and Germantown Reproductive Health Services may seem sudden, it has been known in the Maryland abortion care community that the owner had been considering ceasing operations,” said Diana Philip, the executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Maryland, in a statement. “Our hope is that the clinic owner is closing the current facilities at this time knowing that the new Planned Parenthood clinic in Prince George’s County which opened last year and Dr. LeRoy Carhart’s new practice to be established in Maryland will continue ready access to reproductive healthcare.”

The Maryland Coalition for Life already opened a crisis pregnancy center, a place for pregnant women that looks like a healthcare provider but instead tries to convince them not to have an abortion, across the street from the clinic in Germantown.

In Maryland, abortions are illegal once the fetus is viable, though it makes exceptions in cases necessary for the life or health of the woman. It’s one of 43 states, including Virginia, that restricts later-term abortion. According to 2012 data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a little more than 1 percent of the abortions performed in the U.S. happened after the twentieth week of pregnancy.

News that the Germantown Reproductive Health Services would close its doors this week led the Baltimore Abortion Fund to call for help in fulfilling their pledges to women who need financial assistance to access abortion care.

One woman, Maya, “is a young, disabled woman who has faced a number of barriers trying to access abortion care,” BAF writes. Another, Natalie, is a minor from South Carolina. Both have appointments on Monday but were more than a thousand dollars short in being able to pay for them.

Within six hours, the organization raised $4,436, giving them the money they needed to assist both women.

NARAL Pro-Choice Maryland says that Carhart is hoping to reopen his practice in the Old Line State this fall.

“For the last few years, Dr. Carhart has shared his vision with allies to create his own facility in Maryland to address the dearth of training available to medical professionals in later abortion care,” Stewart said. “In addition to expanding access to care by training more medical professionals interested in offering these services, this new practice would allow Dr. Carhart to continue providing patient-centered care to those referred by their own doctors within Maryland, as well as the many individuals and families who travel from other states seeking this expert care.”

Previously:
One Woman’s Expensive Trek From Georgia To Maryland To Get An Abortion Is Not At All Uncommon
Policy Riders And Lack Of Statehood Put A Major Burden On Abortion Care In D.C.
Women Are Coming To D.C. From Texas And Colorado For Abortions
D.C. And Maryland Buck National Trend Of Restricting Abortion Access
Manassas Abortion Clinic To Close, Leaving Northern Virginia With Four Clinics