Shanette Williams, the mother of Amber Nicole Thurman, holds a photo of her daughter on Oct. 25, 2024. (Roberto Schmidt/AFP via Getty Images)
While pro-choice advocates have suggested the deaths of Thurman and Miller were the result of anti-abortion laws and the chilling effect they have incurred on women seeking abortions, Francis said their deaths were instead the result of a powerful medication that lacks the necessary safeguards.
"Many of the studies that abortion advocates like to quote to state that mifepristone has very few complications don't actually reflect real world use of mifepristone," she said. "Most of those studies, women will have had an in-person visit, as well as an ultrasound, actually documenting how far along they are in their pregnancy, as well as ensuring that they did not have an ectopic pregnancy before they receive those drugs. When, in fact, that's not real-world use right now."
Francis pointed out that real-world use actually "means that they order them online."
When mifepristone was first approved in 2000 by the Food And Drug Administration (FDA), numerous safeguards were put in place. Those included requirements that the medication be dispensed in-person and that patients receive appropriate follow-up care. It also limited the gestational time frame during which pregnant women could use the pill to seven weeks. However, over time, those restrictions were loosened more and more. By 2021, women could get mifepristone without in-person visits, and it was left up to the doctor to trust the patient's account of how far along her pregnancy was.
Doctor checks a patient's symptoms. (iStock)
"If she has an ectopic pregnancy that's undiagnosed, she starts having these symptoms. She's going to think that it's the result of the abortion drugs that she took, and it's normal, and she's going to stay home while she's bleeding into her abdomen and losing precious time. That could be the difference between life and death," Francis said.
Mifepristone is also prone to causing retained tissue and atypical sepsis as well, something Thurman suffered from before her death.
"When we know that this drug carries these kinds of complications, we are saying women deserve better care and better oversight when they're being given these drugs," Francis said. "These are not benign drugs. Women deserve follow-up care. They deserve ongoing care."
Pro-choice advocates argue that mifepristone is safe, citing numerous studies showing its safety and effectiveness, including for treating miscarriages, from as far back as 1988. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the American Medical Association and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists call the drug safe and effective for abortion and miscarriage care.
Autumn Katz, interim director of litigation at the Center for Reproductive Rights, called claims against mifepristone "false," noting they have been "thoroughly debunked."
"It has been used in combination with misoprostol by over 5.9 million patients in the U.S.," she said. "Numerous studies have repeatedly proven its safety and effectiveness for ending an early pregnancy, and mifepristone is also frequently used as a safe and effective treatment for early miscarriage."
Demonstrators gather in front of the Supreme Court as the court hears oral arguments in the case of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine on March 26, 2024, in Washington, D.C. (Anna Rose Layden/Getty Images)
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Fox News Digital spoke to a pro-life emergency room doctor who said he uses mifepristone in conjunction with other drugs to remedy miscarriages. However, according to Lile and Francis, mifepristone's assistance is not statistically significant, or necessary when treating miscarriages. Neither does it remove the need for in-person visits, they said.
"When people think of it outside of the abortion context, they understand how important that in-person evaluation is, how important it is to know exactly how far along someone is," Francis said. "So that's what we're calling for, and [in-person evaluations] being put back into place would not impact a physician's ability to use that drug to treat miscarriage, if that is their protocol for treating miscarriage."
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/doctors-respond-growing-sentiment-abortion-pill-mifepristone-safe