Blitz Bureau
NEW DELHI: The US Supreme Court on May 14 ensured that the abortion pill can continue to be prescribed through telemedicine and dispensed by mail, as the justices restored for now a 2023 federal rule challenged by Republican-governed Louisiana that had made access to the medication easier.
The justices granted requests by two manufacturers of the abortion pill, called mifepristone, to lift a lower court’s block on the rule that was issued by the US Food and Drug Administration during Democratic former President Joe Biden’s administration, while Louisiana’s legal challenge plays out.
The brief order was unsigned and offered no reasoning, as is common with emergency actions by the Supreme Court. Conservative Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas dissented from the decision.
The New Orleans-based 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals on May 1 had ordered the imposition of a previous federal rule that required an in-person clinician visit in order to receive mifepristone.
Drugmakers Danco Laboratories and GenBioPro appealed the 5th Circuit action restricting access to mifepristone, a drug that was given FDA regulatory approval in 2000. The two companies welcomed the court’s action.
The Supreme Court has a 6-3 conservative majority. The ongoing battles over abortion rights follow its 2022 ruling that overturned its 1973 Roe v. Wade precedent that had recognized a woman’s constitutional right to terminate her pregnancy and legalized abortion nationwide.
Near total-ban
That ruling, in a case called Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, prompted 13 states to enact near-total bans on the procedure, while several others sharply restrict access. Those laws have driven a surge in medication abortion.
Since the Dobbs ruling, antiabortion advocates have targeted mifepristone, claiming it is unsafe for women to take and that the FDA should not have approved it or relaxed limits on its use.
