Abortion rights activists continue to wait on ultimate ruling regarding medication abortion
Fifth circuit court vacates, upholds some of lower court's ruling restricting mifepristone
Abortion rights activists and leaders will continue to wait to see how the federal judiciary will ultimately decide how to treat medication abortion.
The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals vacated some parts. It upheld others from a lower court’s decision to nullify the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of mifepristone as an abortion-inducing drug in a two-pill regimen that includes misoprostol. The Supreme Court still has a stay in effect on the lower court’s ruling, which means the current preferred method of combining those drugs will remain an option for women nationwide.
The court of appeals vacated the district court’s suspension of mifepristone’s FDA approval. However, it left intact District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk's suspension of actions taken in 2016 and 2021 to adjust the drug's Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategies to make it more accessible.
Greer Donley, a University of Pittsburgh professor and abortion rights leader, said that telehealth abortions with mifepristone would be severely restricted, if not impossible if the Supreme Court upholds the circuit court’s opinion.
“It will be more expensive, harder to access,” Donley said. “It will overwhelm brick and mortar clinics as virtual clinics struggle to operate.”
Donley pointed out that medication abortion still works with misoprostol alone. In speaking to other abortion providers in the last year, they told me that the effectiveness of the treatment would decrease from 99 percent to 95 percent.
Donley doesn’t know what the Supreme Court would do. She suspects it could vacate more of the district court’s ruling.
“This very much looks like the court is second-guessing the scientific determinations of the FDA, which is what we teach students courts should not be doing,” Donley said.