RALEIGH, North Carolina — Some attempts in North Carolina to limit how abortion pills can be given out have been permanently blocked by a federal judge who said they were illegally going against the authority of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. But she let some state rules stay in place, so the doctor who sued only got a partial victory.
Monday’s injunction by U.S. District Judge Catherine Eagles in Greensboro makes her April 30 decision that some of North Carolina’s rules on medication abortion are no longer valid because they were deemed unnecessary by federal drug inspectors.
North Carolina can’t make it so that only doctors can prescribe the pills, that the drugs can only be given to the patient in person, or that the patient has to make a follow-up visit. This was decided on Monday. It also says that state and local prosecutors, state health and medical officials, and other defendants can’t enforce these rules or use criminal, civil, or professional fines against people who don’t follow them.
Congress gave the FDA the power to closely watch how mifepristone is used. The FDA cleared mifepristone in 2000 as a way to end a pregnancy when mixed with another drug called misoprostol. Eagles wrote in April that the FDA made it clear that limits like North Carolina’s were no longer needed after looking into how safe they were to distribute and use.
In line with FDA rules, her order seems to mean that people in North Carolina can now get the pills from pharmacies after being given them by a nurse practitioner, physician assistant, or through telehealth. They can then take them home.
But the Eagles also supported some restrictions that were being questioned. For example, getting a prescription required an in-person consultation 72 hours in advance, as well as an in-person exam and an ultrasound. She said that these rules either hadn’t been looked at by the FDA and were turned down, or they were more about medicine or patient health in general.
In a prepared statement, Dr. Amy Bryant, who performs abortions and brought this legal case up last year, said that the permanent injunction would “enable more people in North Carolina to get safe and effective medication abortion care.”
The challenged rules on medication abortion are in a law from 2023 that was passed by the Republican-controlled General Assembly. This law kept or added to many previous abortion limits. Because of a change, most abortions can now happen up to 12 weeks into the pregnancy, instead of 20 weeks.
Tuesday, Tami Fitzgerald, head of the conservative North Carolina Values Coalition, said that the decision “lowers the standard of care for women.” She also said that the order was wrong because it got rid of a state requirement that “non-fatal adverse events” linked to mifepristone be reported to the FDA. She said that this would hide “dangerous complications and side effects of abortion drugs.”
Josh Stein, the Democratic Attorney General who supports abortion rights and is now running for governor, didn’t defend the rules in court because he already said the FDA’s decisions were more important. On Tuesday, he said that the illegal parts were made by Republican lawmakers and that “this ruling helps women regain some control over their personal health care decisions.”
The offices of Senate leader Phil Berger and House Speaker Tim Moore, who joined the case to support the laws, didn’t answer an email Tuesday asking for comment right away. They could argue against the Eagles’ decision. An upcoming decision in a different case at the U.S. Supreme Court made by doctors who are against abortion and want the justices to limit access to mifepristone could change the outcome of the case in North Carolina.
Source – AP
