A U.S. appeals court ruled on Wednesday that there must be restrictions on the use of mifepristone for abortion, ordering a ban on telemedicine prescriptions and mail delivery of the drug. However, the decision will not take effect immediately. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans nearly issued a judgment requiring the complete withdrawal of the drug from the market, similar to a lower court's ruling, but ultimately did not do so. Currently, access to mifepristone remains unchanged after an emergency ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court in April maintaining the status quo during the appeal process.
The recent decision will not be implemented until it is reviewed by the Supreme Court, which could happen during its upcoming session from October to June. The three-judge panel reviewed an order issued by U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk in Amarillo, Texas, in April. The ruling followed a lawsuit filed by four anti-abortion groups led by the recently formed Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine and four anti-abortion doctors who filed a lawsuit in November. They argue that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) followed an inappropriate process when it approved mifepristone in 2000 and did not consider the drug's safety in cases involving minors.
The three judges on the panel are strongly conservative and have a history of opposing abortion rights. One judge, William Ho, stated that he would have gone further to order the complete withdrawal of mifepristone from the market. Instead, the panel predominantly halted FDA procedures that facilitated access to this drug in previous years. Among those procedures were allowing mail delivery of the drug, approving its use up to ten weeks of pregnancy instead of seven, reducing the dosage, and decreasing the number of in-person doctor visits required from three to one. Mifepristone is part of a medical abortion regimen that includes a second drug, misoprostol, and is used in more than half of abortion cases in the United States.
