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The Supreme Court unanimously upheld access to the abortion pill mifepristone, saying anti-abortion groups did not have legal standing to challenge the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the medication.
The plaintiffs, led by the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, sought to roll back the FDA’s 2016 and 2021 relaxations of regulatory requirements for mifepristone access.
“Plaintiffs are pro-life, oppose elective abortion, and have sincere legal, moral, ideological, and policy objections to mifepristone being prescribed and used by others,” Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote in the ruling. “Because plaintiffs do not prescribe or use mifepristone, plaintiffs are unregulated parties who seek to challenge FDA’s regulation of others.”
“Under Article III of the Constitution, a plaintiff’s desire to make a drug less available for others does not establish standing to sue,” Kavanaugh wrote.
To note, similar challenges against the pill are being brought by Missouri, Kansas and Idaho, whose attorneys believe they will fare better on legal standing.
Mifepristone, manufactured by Danco Laboratories, is widely used in the U.S. for medication abortion.
After the Supreme Court overturned its Roe v. Wade precedent that legalized abortion in 2022, 14 states moved to ban or restrict the procedure and medical providers in these states cannot prescribe mifepristone.
CVS (CVS) and Walgreens Boots Alliance (WBA) restarted distribution of mifepristone in March where access is legal, after they received an FDA certification for the same.
In other news, Senate Republicans blocked a Democratic-led bill that would’ve guaranteed access to in vitro fertilization and other fertility treatments.
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