DOJ to ask Supreme Court to halt courts’ mifepristone restrictions
The Justice Department is expected to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to halt a pair of rulings by a federal court in Texas and a federal appellate court in New Orleans that would restrict the sale and distribution of the abortion pill mifepristone.
Last week, Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas issued a stay of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the drug 23 years ago, effectively barring its sale and distribution nationwide.
The 5th U.S. Court of Appeals ruled late Wednesday night that access to the drug would not be prohibited pending the outcome of litigation in the case, Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v.
FDA. However, in the meantime the appellate court preserved other restrictions on mifepristone from Kacsmaryk’s ruling including the prohibition of distributing the medicine by mail or prescribing its FDA approved generic equivalent and requiring that it be prescribed only after three in-person visits with a healthcare provider, and only up to seven weeks of pregnancy. “The Justice Department strongly disagrees with the 5th Circuit’s decision in Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v.
