AUSTIN, Texas — Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton requested the U.S. Court of Appeals to stay a nationwide injunction suspending a rule that requires women to visit a hospital, clinic or medical office to obtain an abortion pill.
A federal judge suspended the rule last month, concluding in-person requirements for patients seeking medication abortion care impose a “substantial obstacle” to abortion patients and are likely unconstitutional under the circumstances of the pandemic.
The ruling allows health care providers to arrange for mifepristone to be mailed or delivered to patients during the public health emergency declared by the secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved mifepristone to be used in combination with a second drug, misoprostol, to end an early pregnancy or manage a miscarriage.
The states of Indiana, Louisiana, Alabama, Arkansas, Idaho, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska and Oklahoma had asked to intervene in the lawsuit. The 10 states argued that the case could impact how they enforce their own state laws that relate to or reference the FDA’s regulation of mifepristone. Their request was rejected, with the judge saying the federal case would not eliminate any state’s ability to continue to regulate abortion medication “above and beyond” the FDA’s requirements.
On Wednesday, Paxton said Texas joined the 10 other states in a friend-of-the-court brief.
“This medication is strictly required to be dispensed in-person due to the serious risks it poses to women’s health. The ongoing pandemic does not change the need for close examination and observation of a patient using mifepristone,” said Paxton. “The COVID-19 pandemic only reinforces the need to follow reasonable guidelines when prescribing potentially dangerous medications to prevent patients from being forced into hospitals already dealing with the strain of the pandemic. To argue otherwise demonstrates lack of true interest in women’s health and safety.”
But Skye Perryman, chief legal officer for the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, said last month the FDA’s restrictions on mifepristone are not medically necessary and “do not advance the health and safety of patients.”
“Today’s ruling recognizes the hardship and undue burden that many women have faced obtaining essential health care during the COVID-19 pandemic,” Perryman said.
The group’s lawsuit said mifepristone is the only one of more than 20,000 FDA-regulated drugs that patients must receive in person at a hospital, clinic or medical office “yet may self-administer, unsupervised, at a location of their choosing.”
Paxton’s amicus brief argues the district court’s current injunction prevents the Food and Drug Administration from enforcing provisions of the Elements to Assure Safe Use for the mifepristone Risk Evaluation & Mitigation Strategy (REMS).
A federal judge last month concluded in-person requirements for patients seeking medication abortion care impose a “substantial obstacle” and are likely unconstitutional under the circumstances of the pandemic.
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