Just the Pill, a non-profit organisation that helps patients obtain abortion pills in several states, received nearly one hundred requests for appointments in the hours following the release of the Supreme Court’s decision that overturned the legal right to abortion in the United States. Just the Pill helps patients obtain abortion pills in several states.
That was around four times as many appointment requests as the organisation typically received on a daily basis, and a large number of them came from patients in Texas and other states that swiftly stopped performing abortions following the court verdict.
The pharmaceutical abortion procedure may only be used inside the first ten weeks of a pregnancy before the Food and Drug Administration gives its approval for its use. It entails taking two separate medications between 24 and 48 hours apart in order to interrupt the development of a pregnancy and then to create contractions similar to a miscarriage in order to evacuate the baby. The treatment often generates bleeding that is comparable to that of a heavy menstruation.
The patient is required to take part in the consultation from a state that legalises abortion, even if this participation takes the form of just talking on the phone while driving just over the state line. The clinic is able to determine the patient’s location by using the IP address of the computer or phone the patient is using.
Abortion using medicine is anticipated to provide substantial obstacles to the enforcement of abortion bans in states that prohibit all methods of abortion. According to the opinions of several legal experts, it is one thing to close down a clinic, but it is far more difficult to police actions such as shipping or receiving drugs over the mail or flying to a state in which pills are permitted to have a consultation and pick them up.
In a separate statement, Attorney General Merrick B. Garland made particular reference to the medicine mifepristone, which is the first pill used as part of the pharmaceutical abortion process. The restriction that individuals get mifepristone by personally visiting an approved clinic or doctor in order to do so was lifted permanently in December by the Food and Drug Administration, which made access to it substantially simpler.
However, it is not apparent what actions the Justice Department can take at this time. It has been maintained by some legal academics that the licencing of a medicine by the federal government pre-empts any acts taken by states to limit the use of a drug. Others argue that this has only been the case in situations when a state has raised concerns about the medication’s effectiveness or safety.
In an opinion that concurred with the decision of the Supreme Court, Justice Brett Kavanaugh suggested that patients who travelled to other states to receive an abortion would be protected by the constitutional right to interstate travel. This opinion was written in response to a question from another justice.
