Since the Roe vs. Wade ruling was overturned last June, and at the federal level the right to abortion was canceled and placed in the hands of individual states, concern regarding the future of rights has grown. It wasn’t a wrong perception. Yesterday Matthew Kacsmaryk, a federal judge in Amarillo, Texas, heard arguments from the same group that helped overturn Roe vs. Wade, and which is now challenging the Food and Drugs Administration’s approval of mifepristone, one of the 2 drugs used in pharmacological abortions.
Mifepristone had been approved on September 28, 2000 for use in combination with misoprostol for termination of pregnancy up to the 10th week. Later, it was also approved for use in the management of ectopic pregnancy syndrome and in preparation for the uterine curettage procedure.
The group that is trying to discontinue the use of this drug argues that the FDA extended its authority by approving mifepristone without adequately weighing the risks. Health experts and the FDA dispute the allegations that come following 23 years of use, during which these feared harmfulnesses would have widely manifested themselves.
In the United States to date, pharmacological abortions account for more than half of legal abortions. By using mifepristone, women avoid going through a surgical operation under general anesthesia.
To block the progesterone hormone and prevent the pregnancy from progressing, the patients take a pill of mifepristone and, 24 hours later, 4 pills of misoprostol, a drug for the treatment of gastric ulcers in use since 1973, and which in this case it serves to soften the cervix and cause the contractions that expel the fetus.
The editors recommend:
Poland. Abortion is murder, still not quite
Precisely because of the decision of the Supreme Court in June which effectively removed the right to abortion for the millions of US women living in Republican-led states, in January of this year the FDA approved the sale of the abortion pill in all certified pharmacies, in order to simplify access to medical abortion: previously, in fact, women might only obtain the drug in outpatient clinics and from specialized doctors. The prescription is still necessary in order to proceed with the collection in the store or by mail.
The judge called expressing himself on the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine vs US Food and Drug Administration case now finds himself dealing with a hot potato that he clearly had no desire to handle.
Earlier this week, Kacsmaryk asked attorneys for both sides not to disclose the date of the hearing, intending to enter it in the public record only the night before, the New York Times revealed.
The reason would be to want to protect the safety and order of the trial, and the transcripts of a phone call made by the judge and published by the New York newspaper, report the judge’s claims that he has received multiple death threats.
As we write it is not yet clear whether the verdict will be decided in this hearing, the outcome of the trial certainly affects millions of women, and might make the use of mifepristone impossible even in states where abortion is legal.
The editors recommend:
Italy and Spain: the unequal comparison between legislation on abortion
If that were to happen it would not give an immediate turnaround. To revoke a drug’s approval, the FDA must first set more public hearings and take new steps, and this is a lengthy process that can take months or years. Furthermore, the federal government might decide to immediately appeal any negative decision by Kacsmaryk, bringing the case before the Supreme Court.
Vice President Kamala Harris called the lawsuit once morest the FDA “an attack on a woman’s fundamental freedom” and “an attack on the scientific process that is crucial to the public.”
