After making it through the state legislature, a bill that reschedules two medications used in abortions as “controlled dangerous substances” has now been signed into Louisiana state law, making it the first US state to make such a move.
Under bill SB 276, mifepristone and misoprostol have been reclassified as Schedule IV substances – a group typically reserved for substances like Xanax and Valium – meaning that anyone found in possession of them without a prescription could be subject to fines and even jail time. Pregnant women, however, will be exempt from prosecution.
The original subject of the bill was to make it a crime to give women abortion pills without their knowledge – which passed through the House and Senate – with the reclassification of the two medications later added as an amendment.
Mifepristone and misoprostol can be used in combination to end a pregnancy. The former is taken first to block the body’s progesterone, which stops the pregnancy from growing. Misoprostol is then taken up to 48 hours later in order to empty out the uterus.
However, they do have medical uses beyond abortion: misopristol, for example, can be used to prevent stomach ulcers, whilst mifepristone is a treatment for high blood sugar in some people with Cushing’s syndrome.
Abortion is already banned in Louisiana unless under very specific circumstances, such as to save the pregnant person’s life – though rape and incest were recently rejected as exceptions.
Advocates of the new law, such as Governor Jeff Landry, have argued that it “protects women across Louisiana”. Opponents are concerned that it could affect access to the pills for their other uses, and that rescheduling them has no basis in science.
“They are safe and effective, and they are not dangerous drugs of abuse to be on a schedule of a controlled dangerous substance list,” emergency medicine physician Dr Jennifer Avegno, the director of the New Orleans Health Department, told NBC News. “From a medical standpoint, health care providers think this is bad science and not well-informed.”
The future of access to abortion medications goes beyond Louisiana, however – it’s about to play out on the national stage. In the coming weeks, the Supreme Court is expected to rule on FDA v Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, in which the latter is arguing that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) shouldn’t have made it easier to access mifepristone.
If successful – though there’s some skepticism that it will be – the FDA could be forced to make changes to the prescription rules for abortion medication, which could make the pills more difficult to access on a national scale.
The current case came in the wake of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v Wade back in 2022, ending 50 years of federal abortion rights.
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