Oklahoma Senate Passes Bill to Limit Dangerous Abortion Drug

State   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Apr 26, 2011   |   5:00PM   |   Oklahoma City, OK

The Oklahoma Senate passed today a bill designed to protect women from the dangerous abortion drug RU 486 and abortion centers that fail to follow FDA guidelines when giving the abortion drug to women.

The mifepristone abortion pill has already killed more than 13 women worldwide, including several women in the United States, and has injured 1,100 women in the U.S. alone as of 2006 FDA figures.

The measure, the Abortion-Inducing Drugs Safety Act (HB 1970) received approval in the Senate by an overwhelming majority of 39-6. The bill, based upon American United for Life’s model of the same name, previously passed the Oklahoma House 83-5 and Governor Mary Fallin is expected to sign it into law.

“For too long, abortion providers have been dispensing abortion-inducing drugs in an unsafe manner that serves only to boost their own profit margins and it must stop. We are proud to have assisted in the passage of this bill,” said AUL president Charmaine Yoest.

HB 1970 requires that abortion providers dispense abortion-inducing drugs only in the way tested and approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and outlined in the drug’s label. These requirements will prevent the dangerous “off-label” use of abortion-inducing drugs that has killed at least seven women in the United States alone—an “off-label” use that Planned Parenthood readily admits, on its website and in court documents, to using.

Representative Randy Grau and Senator Greg Treat introduced the bill for the purpose of protecting women from the proven dangers inherent in abortion drugs.  The bill requires that physicians examine a woman before dispensing an abortion-inducing drug to assess the stage of the pregnancy and to ensure that she does not have any hidden conditions making the drug even more dangerous for her.

Off-label usage of the abortion drug has been a concern for years and

Planned Parenthood previously told women using it to use the drug vaginally instead of orally, as recommended by the FDA. That causes the introduction of bacteria that resulted in lethal infections causing their deaths.

Although Planned Parenthood eventually changed its protocol to follow the FDA suggestion to take the drug orally, it still dispenses improper doses of the drug that could still place women at risk.

Rather than backing down from dispensing the abortion drug, Planned Parenthood is increasingly giving it to women, and a 2010 survey of Planned Parenthood abortion centers finds a higher number are giving women the dangerous RU 486 abortion drug. The number of locations dispensing the dangerous abortion drug has risen 130 percent since its last national survey, even though the overall number of Planned Parenthood centers is on the decline.

In January 2008, RU 486 maker Danco Laboratories announced approximately 13 percent of all abortions in the United States involve mifepristone — a number that may seem low but it is double the number of women who used the abortion drug in 2001.

The report also showed 57 percent of places that do abortions now have the abortion drug, compared with just 33 percent in 2001. Ultimately, Danco indicated that 840,000 women in the United States have had abortions with its dangerous drug – a number that is very likely over one million in the two and a half years that have passed.

According to FDA reports as of December 2006, there have now been eight known deaths associated with mifepristone in the U.S., nine life-threatening incidents, 116 blood transfusions, and 232 hospitalizations. In total, more than 1,100 women have had medical problems after using the drug as of that date. The Obama administration has not published new totals, which could have well over 1,500 women in the United States alone facing significant problems after using the mifepristone abortion drug.