Supreme Court Extends Order Allowing Abortion Pills by Mail

The US Supreme Court extended a temporary order that lets medical providers keep dispensing a widely used abortion pill by mail while the justices debate privately how to handle the issue.

The order keeps a pause on a federal appeals court decision that would require patients to visit a provider in person to get a prescription for mifepristone. The new Supreme Court order lasts until May 14.

Louisiana is seeking to upend the Food and Drug Administration’s decision during Joe Biden’s presidency to permit remote prescriptions for mifepristone. The state says regulators gave short shrift to safety concerns.

Mifepristone has been available by mail since 2021, when the FDA said it would stop enforcing the in-person rule because of the pandemic. The FDA formally lifted the requirement in 2023.

The clash has threatened to upend abortion access nationwide. Pill-induced abortions accounted for 63% of all abortions in 2023, and mifepristone was used in the vast majority of cases, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research organization that supports reproductive rights. Louisiana and other states with abortion bans say remote prescriptions are undermining those laws.

The drug’s manufacturers, Danco Laboratories LLC and GenBioPro Inc., asked the Supreme Court to intervene, saying in separate requests that the 5th US Court of Appeals created chaos by restricting access to mifepristone even in states where abortion is legal. The companies say the FDA acted based on a wealth of evidence that mifepristone is safe without an in-person visit.

The cases are Danco v. Louisiana, 25a1207, and GenBioPro v. Louisiana, 25a1208.

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