While the fate of mifepristone, also known as the abortion pill, plays out in US courts, health-care providers have another drug they can continue to use to offer medication abortion.
Misoprostol is primarily an ulcer medication, but it’s used in conjunction with mifepristone in 98% of all reported medication abortions in the US, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research organization that backs reproductive rights. The combination is “the gold standard for medication abortion in the US and elsewhere,” said Alice Mark, interim medical advisor for the National Abortion Federation.
Last week US District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, appointed by President Donald Trump, issued an order suspending the decades-old approval for mifepristone. Late Wednesday, the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals partially stayed that ruling. Misoprostol, originally developed in 1973, was first marketed as a treatment for gastrointestinal issues. One of its side effects is that it induces miscarriages and in the late 1980s, women in Brazil with no legal access to abortion began taking it to end pregnancies. It has a two year shelf life.
Medication abortion has become increasingly popular in the US because it’s a less invasive and is seen as a more convenient alternative to having a procedure done at a health-care clinic. As of 2020 more than 50% of all facility-based abortions were done using pills, up from 24% about a decade earlier.
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