Louisiana and one individual plaintiff filed a new lawsuit attacking mifepristone: Louisiana v. FDA (W.D. La.). Louisiana, and an individual woman who claims to have been coerced into taking mifepristone by her boyfriend, have challenged the FDA’s 2023 modifications to the Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy (REMS) for mifepristone, which removed the in-person dispensing requirement and permitted the distribution of mifepristone by mail and retail pharmacies, relying on the long-dormant Comstock Act.
On December 17, Louisiana moved for a preliminary injunction seeking to immediately reinstate the in-person dispensing requirement nationwide—in other words, to force every mifepristone patient in the country to travel to a health center just to be handed the pill, even when they have already been thoroughly evaluated and counseled through telemedicine and there is no clinical reason for this visit.
On February 20, NWLC joined an amicus brief on behalf of more than 100 reproductive rights, health, and justice movement organizations to the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana, opposing the preliminary injunction motion. Our brief details the overwhelming evidence of mifepristone’s safety, including when provided through telemedicine, and debunks the other side’s junk science. The brief further emphasizes the importance of mifepristone (and medication abortion generally) to people’s health and autonomy and explains how telemedicine is essential to accessing abortion and miscarriage care following Dobbs. Finally, the brief breaks down the harmful medical, personal, professional, and educational consequences that plaintiffs’ requested relief could have on communities across the nation, particularly for people in rural areas, low-income communities, communities of color, and for survivors of intimate partner violence.