(AFP) – US regulators have approved an additional generic version of the abortion pill mifepristone, a normally routine move that nevertheless angered anti-abortion activists. A number of conservative figures and anti-abortion groups decried the regulatory step, with the institution Students for Life Action calling it “a stain on the Trump presidency.”
The drugmaker Evita said on its website the US Food and Drug Administration had this week approved the company’s generic tablet, which is currently approved to end pregnancies up to 70 days of gestation. The medication is used in the majority of abortions in the United States, and also routinely used for managing early miscarriage. The FDA originally approved mifepristone in 2000, and another generic already exists. Approvals of additional generics are typically routine.
But Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the organization Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, called the approval “reckless” and “unconscionable” in a statement Thursday. Senator Josh Hawley, a Republican from Missouri, said on X he had “lost confidence” in FDA leadership while former vice president Mike Pence posted it was “a complete betrayal of the pro-life movement that elected President Trump.” Pence also called for the dismissal of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump’s controversial health chief.
The ruckus comes weeks after Kennedy and FDA Commissioner Marty Makary reportedly delivered a letter to 22 Republican attorneys general saying the FDA was conducting a new review of mifepristone’s safety. Abortion rights organizations have dubbed that a blatant attempt to undermine health care access, and a coalition of attorneys general from more than a dozen Democratic-led states vowed to protect availability of the drug.
The American Medical Association has called the prescription drug “exceedingly safe and effective” and said restricting access to mifepristone would “jeopardize public health.” That take echoes the positions of many leading medical institutions. Mifepristone, which prevents pregnancy progression, is generally used in combination with misoprostol, which empties the uterus.
© 2024 AFP
