By Dave Andrusko
During the COVID-19 pandemic, among the most significant objectives of the Abortion Lobby is to eliminate FDA-mandated requirements that safeguard the health of women who undergo chemical—“medication”–abortions.
Such abortions involve two drugs: mifepristone and misoprostol. The long-sought objective is to allow mifepristone to be dispensed by pharmacies and (better yet from their perspective) through the mail. The ultimate goal is highly-dangerous Do-It-Yourself abortions.
NPR tells us, “In a federal lawsuit filed in Maryland on behalf of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) and other groups, the American Civil Liberties Union requests an emergency order lifting regulations requiring patients in the United States to pick up the drug at a hospital or medical facility,” an allusion to the FDA’s Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy (REMS).
The ACLU has targeted REMS for years. Under its provisions, as summarized by Patrick Adams, “mifepristone can be dispensed only in clinics, medical offices and hospitals; only by, or under the supervision of, a doctor certified to prescribe the drug; and only to patients who have signed an F.D.A.-approved patient agreement.”
And as always, the ACLU tells us none of this is necessary, in fact is discriminatory.
In its May 27 filing, the ACLU opened a second front in its war on REMS. Going back to 2017, it said it wants REMS eliminated for medication abortions.
The new suit is “more narrow,” NPR’s Sarah McCammon tells. Paraphrasing the ACLU’s Julia Kaye, McCammon writes that the ACLU is “asking the court to suspend the rules during the pandemic only.”
Cynically trading on attempts during the pandemic to “forego unnecessary in-person visits,” the ACLU lawsuit “asks for an emergency order allowing the mifepristone to be dispensed through the mail or by pharmacies.”
Through all this, the FDA has held firm in its requirements, supported by pro-life elected officials and pro-life organizations, such as National Right to Life.
In a letter sent to FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn, M.D., thirty-eight Senators and 121 Representatives urged “robust enforcement” of the REMS involving the mifepristone abortion-drug process. The members of Congress wrote,
Despite claims that medication abortion is safe and easy, research proves that as many as five to seven percent of women who take abortion drugs will require follow-up surgery, and three percent could end up in the emergency room. Self-managed abortions from home are especially dangerous; in fact, half of abortion providers do not consider them safe, according to a 2019 survey published in the journal Contraception. Further, medication abortion becomes even more dangerous in situations where women cannot access emergency medical care. This is especially concerning during the COVID-19 pandemic as emergency rooms are currently being overwhelmed.
In addition, as NRL News Today reported, National Right to Life joined more than four dozen pro-life and pro-family groups in a letter sent to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration asking the FDA to take action against the illegal sale of abortion-inducing drugs. The letter can be found here.
“Internet sales of mifepristone have the potential to multiply the inherent dangers of the drug combination, further endangering women’s lives which are already at risk in the abortion procedure,” said Carol Tobias, president of National Right to Life.