The Supreme Court is expected to rule by Friday night about preserving access to the abortion pill mifepristone while a legal challenge to the drug’s approval continues.
On Wednesday, the high court extended by two days a stay that allowed sales of the pill. The justices are weighing whether to block orders by lower courts that would put new limits on the widely used drug.
The justices are scheduled to meet for a private conference Friday, during which they could talk about the issue, the Associated Press reported. The extra time could be part of an effort to craft an order that has broad support among the justices, the AP wrote.
Without intervention by the Supreme Court, new limits on mifepristone are set to go into effect at the end of the day Friday.
Abortion opponents in November asserted in a Texas case that the Food and Drug Administration’s original approval of the drug was flawed, as were later changes. The Biden administration and Danco Laboratories LLC, which makes the drug, have filed emergency requests to maintain public access to mifepristone.
See: Justice Department appeals ‘extraordinary and unprecedented’ Texas abortion-pill ruling
A U.S. District Court judge in Texas appointed by former President Donald Trump suspended the pill’s approval, but a later ruling by a New Orleans-based appeals court narrowed the Texas decision. Under the later ruling, the FDA was ordered to return to a pre-2016 regimen for the drug.
That ruling, as the AP explains, would effectively nullify changes made by the FDA starting in 2016, including an extension of the period when mifepristone can be safely used from seven to 10 weeks of pregnancy. The court also said that the drug can’t be mailed or dispensed as a generic and that patients who seek it must have three in-person visits with a doctor. Patients also might be required to take a higher dosage of the drug than the FDA says is necessary.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
