On March 26, demonstrators held an abortion rights rally outside the Supreme Court, where justices heard oral arguments. U.S. Food and Drug Administration v. Hippocratic Medical Alliance.
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Some abortion providers are stocking mifepristone. Others are prepared to use alternative medical treatments to terminate their pregnancies. But the Supreme Court’s decision Thursday to uphold the FDA’s rules on abortion drugs means none of them are necessary, at least for now.
“We’re open for business as usual,” said Lauren Jacobson, a nurse practitioner in Massachusetts who provides abortion pills, including mifepristone, by mail. It will be more difficult than it is now. Jacobson works for Aid Access, one of the largest abortion-by-mail organizations, sending pills to all 50 states. prescription.
This morning in New Jersey, Dr. Christine Brandi is meeting with staff at a clinic that provides abortion services to discuss contingency plans if mifepristone is no longer available.
“All of a sudden, we all got a buzz on our phones and realized the results were in and they were unanimously — so shockingly, unanimously — dismissed,” she said. “We all stood in silence for a second – we were all shocked, but also very excited and relieved that we didn’t have to worry about this anymore.”
Mifepristone is one of two prescription drugs used for medical abortion, accounting for 63% of all abortions in the United States. It works by blocking the hormones needed for pregnancy to continue. It was first approved in the United States in 2000 and is now used by more than 5 million people.
The possibility that mifepristone will become less available nationwide “has been looming for weeks,” Brandy said.
A group of anti-abortion doctors have challenged the FDA’s approval of mifepristone. They won a landslide victory before a federal judge in Texas and a more limited victory in the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals.
On Thursday, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled they had no grounds to sue the agency. “Plaintiffs have sincere legal, moral, ideological, and policy objections to elective abortion and FDA’s deregulation of mifepristone. But these types of objections alone do not establish credibility in federal court under Article III of the Constitution.” case or controversy before it,” Judge Brett Kavanaugh wrote in the ruling. He went on to suggest that the plaintiffs express their opposition in other ways, including through political or legislative means.
The Justice Department, which defended the FDA in the case, celebrated the decision. Attorney General Merrick Garland wrote in a statement: “For more than two decades and across five presidential administrations, millions of Americans have relied on the FDA’s expert judgment that mifepristone is useful for ending… It is safe and effective in early pregnancy.
Mary Ziegler, a historian at the University of California, Davis, said more plaintiffs — including some in Republican-led states — are lining up in lower courts to challenge mifepristone’s access again. “I think the best way to read this is that the Supreme Court put it on hold,” she said.
Erin Hawley (in blue), a Missouri attorney representing the Hippocratic Medical Alliance, leaves the Supreme Court after oral arguments in Washington, D.C.
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Erin Hawley
“We still have work to do,” said Hawley, the wife of Missouri Republican Sen. Josh Hawley. Briefing reporters, Hawley said her organization was “encouraged and hopeful that the FDA will be held accountable” because the case was dismissed on a legal technicality and the judges did not weigh in on the merits.
Kavanaugh wrote that doctors already have federal conscience protections, meaning they don’t have to prescribe mifepristone if they don’t want to. “We would have liked a different ruling,” Hawley said.
“It is a travesty that the FDA will not pursue accountability,” Chelsey Youman of the anti-abortion rights group Humanity Alliance wrote in a statement, calling on states to uphold 19th-century anti-pornography laws. The Tork Act prohibits the mailing of abortion-related items. This is a law that has not been enforced for 50 years.
Reproductive rights groups expressed cautious relief at the ruling, noting that the status quo is not exactly a victory because more than half of U.S. states severely restrict abortion.
“We are relieved by this outcome, but we are not celebrating,” wrote Destiny Lopez of the pro-abortion rights Guttmacher Institute. “From the beginning, this case stemmed from Malice, [lacked] Any factual or scientific basis.
Dr. Louise King, director of reproductive ethics at Harvard Medical School’s Center for Bioethics, said the Supreme Court got the right decision in the case but agreed with Ziegler that mifepristone may face more challenges. “It’s just a pause in panic, that’s all,” she said.
Stella Dantas, president of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, wrote in a statement: “If this case proves anything, it is that we must strengthen protection of mifepristone and further increase access to mifepristone. Opportunity.
Currently, mifepristone is still available up to 10 weeks of pregnancy in places where abortion is legal, and can be prescribed via telemedicine.
