One down, 49 to go.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A board in Kansas has unanimously approved new regulations for abortion providers, moving the state closer to becoming the first in the nation without a clinic or doctor’s office performing the procedures.

Approval of the rules by the five-member State Rules and Regulations Board was necessary for the Kansas Department of Health and Environment to begin enforcing them Friday. But abortion providers have filed a federal lawsuit and hope to prevent the state from enforcing the regulations and the new licensing law under which they were written. A hearing in that lawsuit is scheduled for 3 p.m. Friday in U.S. District Court in Kansas City, Kan.

Kansas has three abortion providers, all in the Kansas City area. The law requires each to obtain a special license to continue performing abortions. The regulations tell providers what equipment and drugs they must stock and set space and temperature requirements for procedure and recovery rooms.

Only one provider, a Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri clinic in the Kansas City suburb of Overland Park, had a licensing decision pending Thursday with the health department. One provider has been denied a license; the third hasn’t been inspected and can’t get a license until it is.