Louisiana’s new law on abortion drugs establishes risky treatment
delays, lawsuit claims
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[November 01, 2024]
By SARA CLINE and KEVIN McGILL
BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Louisiana's new law categorizing two widely used
abortion drugs as “controlled dangerous substances” was challenged in a
state court lawsuit Thursday by a physician, a pharmacist and others who
say the legislation sets up needless, dangerous delays in treatment
during medical emergencies.
Although there already was a near-total abortion ban in Louisiana,
including by medication, the reclassification of the drugs —
mifepristone and misoprostol, which have other critical reproductive
health care uses — went into effect earlier this month. Proponents of
the law said more oversight and control over the drugs was needed to
prevent coerced abortions. They have used as an example a Texas case in
which a pregnant woman was given seven misoprostol pills by her husband
without her knowledge. The baby survived.
Doctors critical of the law have said it could harm patients facing
emergency complications such as postpartum hemorrhages by requiring
medical personnel to go through extra steps and more stringent storage
requirements to use the drugs.
“Even short delays in accessing misoprostol can be life-threatening for
postpartum hemorrhage patients,” says the lawsuit. It says the law
violates the Louisiana Constitution in multiple ways, including a
prohibition on discrimination based on a person's physical condition.
Louisiana Attorney General Elizabeth Murrill said she had not seen the
lawsuit as of Thursday afternoon. “I can’t respond to a lawsuit we have
not seen, but I’m confident this law is constitutional," she said in a
statement. "We will vigorously defend it.”
In addition to the physician and the pharmacist, who the lawsuit says is
pregnant, the plaintiffs in the case include the Birthmark Doula
Collective, an organization of people trained to provide pregnancy care
before, during and after birth.
Other plaintiffs include Nancy Davis, a woman who was denied an abortion
in Louisiana and traveled out of state for one after learning her fetus
would not survive. A woman who said she was turned away from two
emergency rooms instead of being treated for a miscarriage is also part
of the lawsuit.
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Mifepristone tablets are seen in a Planned Parenthood clinic
Thursday, July 18, 2024, in Ames, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall,
File)
Prior to the reclassification, a
prescription was still needed to obtain mifepristone and misoprostol
in Louisiana. The new law reclassified the pills as “Schedule IV
drugs,” putting them in the same category as the opioid tramadol and
other substances that can be addictive.
The new classification means that if someone knowingly possesses
mifepristone or misoprostol without a valid prescription for any
purpose, they could be fined up to $5,000 and sent to jail for one
to five years.
The law carves out protections for pregnant women who obtain the
drug without a prescription to take on their own.
The legislation is a first-of-its-kind law in the U.S. While GOP
Gov. Jeff Landry, many Republican lawmakers and anti-abortion groups
have touted the new classification, doctors have warned of deadly
delays that the law could cause.
Under the new classification, doctors say there are extra steps and
more stringent storage requirements, which could slow access to the
drugs in emergency situations. Beyond inducing abortions, the pills
are also used to treat miscarriages, induce labor and stop
hemorrhaging.
Prior to the law, some doctors said that misoprostol would be stored
in a box in the hospital room, on the delivery table or in a nurse's
pocket. But under the new requirements of the classification, the
drugs may be down the hall in a locked container or potentially
in-house pharmacy at smaller hospitals.
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McGill reported from New Orleans.
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