The Supreme Court of the United States annulled this Thursday the restrictions imposed on access to a abortion pill, mifepristone, but President Joe Biden warned that “the fight” for reproductive rights continues.
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In their unanimous ruling, the nine judges of the court, with a conservative majority, affirm that the doctors and anti-abortion groups who challenged the drug They lacked standing to present the case.
Consequently, they annul a ruling on appeal, which they had already suspended anyway.
Biden’s predecessor and rival in the November election, Donald Trump, leads the Republican Party, widely favorable to restrictions on access to abortion.
Biden and anti-abortion groups reacted cautiously to the ruling of the Supreme Court, with a conservative majority, which left the door open to combat mifepristone in other forums.
“Today’s decision does not change the fact that the fight for reproductive freedom continues”, Biden said in a statement.
“The attacks on medical abortion are part of the extreme and dangerous agenda” of the Republicans “to ban abortion throughout the country,” he adds.
Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights, expressed “relief and anger” at the decision.
“Sadly, the attacks on abortion pills will not stop here,” Northup said. “In the end, this ruling is not a ‘victory’ for abortion: it only maintains the status quo, which is a serious public health crisis,” he estimated.
The right to abortion is one of the main issues of the November elections and the government of Biden asked the Court to maintain access to the drug, which was approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 2000.
“We recognize that many citizens, including the physician plaintiffs here, have sincere concerns and objections to others using mifepristone and undergoing abortions,” Justice Brett Kavanaugh said.
“But the Citizens and doctors do not have active standing to sue simply because others are allowed to carry out certain activities,” he added.
“The plaintiffs lack standing to challenge the FDA’s actions,” he insisted.
A “wrong forum”
The conservative judge ruled that federal courts are “the wrong forum to address plaintiffs’ concerns about the FDA’s actions.” In his opinion they can express their objections through regulatory procedures or through “political and electoral processes.”
In June 2022, the Supreme Court annulled the constitutional right to abortion which had been in force for half a century and gave the states full freedom to legislate in this area.
Since then, about 20 states have banned or restricted abortion, but surveys show that Most Americans support access to safe abortion.
Abortion opponents are trying to restrict access to the pill nationwide, claiming it is unsafe and that anti-abortion doctors are forced to go against their conscience when caring for patients who suffer complications after using it.
A conservative Texas district court judge appointed by former Republican President Donald Trump issued a ruling last year that would have banned mifepristone.
An appeals court overturned this blanket ban, but restricted access to medicine reducing the period during which mifepristone can be used from 10 weeks pregnant to 7 weeks, preventing it from being mailed and requiring that the pill be prescribed and administered by a doctor.
The Supreme Court ruling lifts these restrictions.
Medical abortion represented the 63% of those practiced in the country last year, up from 53% in 2020, according to the Guttmacher Institute.
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Source: https://www.noticiascaracol.com/mundo/corte-suprema-anulo-restricciones-para-acceso-a-pildora-abortiva-en-ee-uu-cb20
