A federal judge in Texas announced this Friday the suspension of the marketing authorization in the United States for mifepristone, one of the two pills used for abortion, which effectively prevents its prescription.
However, District Magistrate Matthew J. Kacsmaryk, appointed by the former Trump administration, gave federal authorities a week to appeal the decision.
The abortion drug has been widely used in the United States since 2000, and there is essentially no precedent for a judge single-handedly overturning medical decisions by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
Mifepristone is one of two drugs used for medical abortion in the United States, along with misoprostol.
The judge ordered the FDA to withhold authorization of mifepristone, pending a lawsuit challenging the drug’s safety and approval, but the impact is unclear.
The magistrate did not go as far as the plaintiffs intended, withdrawing or suspending approvals for chemical abortion drugs and removing them from the list of authorized drugs.
Clinics and doctors who prescribe the combination of the two drugs said that if mifepristone were withdrawn from the market, they would switch to using only the second drug, misoprostol.
This single-drug approach has a slightly lower effectiveness rate for terminating a pregnancy, but is widely used in countries where mifepristone is illegal or unavailable.
Mifepristone is part of a two-drug regimen that has long been the standard for medical abortion in the United States.
Source: TSF
