Elizabeth Warren Asks FDA to Stop Enforcing Abortion Pill Restrictions During Pandemic

Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren
Credit: Gage Skidmore / Flickr

Senators Elizabeth Warren, Patty Murray, and Tammy Baldwin called on FDA commissioner Stephen Hahn Tuesday to use enforcement discretion to look the other way if abortion providers attempt to skirt abortion pill regulations during the COVID-19 outbreak.

“People who need an abortion cannot delay care and should not needlessly risk coronavirus exposure,” the senators wrote in their letter (available here). “Given the years of scientific evidence indicating that medication abortion is a safe and effective treatment, we ask that FDA take immediate steps to temporarily exercise enforcement discretion on in-person dispensing requirements, so that people can more easily access abortion care without putting themselves or their healthcare providers at risk of infection from COVID-19.”

The FDA places restrictions on the distribution of the abortion pill regiment so that physicians can check a pregnant woman for conditions such as ectopic pregnancy (a condition in which an unborn child develops outside the uterus). If a woman with an ectopic pregnancy attempts to undergo a DIY abortion using the abortion pill regiment, they are likely to have severe complications such as hemorrhage and death.

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