Judge Strikes Oklahoma Law Putting Limits on Dangerous Abortion Pill RU 486

State   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Aug 11, 2015   |   10:03AM   |   Washington, DC

In Oklahoma, District Judge Patricia Parrish has deemed a pro-life law unconstitutional after the New York-based Center for Reproductive Rights filed a lawsuit against the state. As LifeNews previously reported, the law required doctors who prescribe the RU-486 abortion regimen to abide by FDA requirements that the agency provides for use of the drug. In 2013, the Oklahoma Supreme Court struck down the law based on their opinion that it placed “undue burden” on women seeking abortions.

The senior staff attorney for the Center for Reproductive Rights, Autumn Katz, said the law is unconstitutionally because it places special restrictions on the drug that others don’t have; improperly gives legislative authority to the FDA; and interferes with an abortionists’ decision to distribute it. Additionally, she told ABC News that banning the off-label use of the drugs doesn’t serve the states interests.

The Deputy Solicitor General, Mithun Mansinghani, disagreed and argued that the Legislature was worried about the wellbeing of women when it passed the measure. He said, “This particular method has safer alternatives.” In the United States, Arizona, Arkansas, North Dakota and Texas have passed laws to protect women from the dangerous regimen.

The spokesman for Attorney General Scott Pruitt, Aaron Cooper, said in an email that the office will appeal the decision. He said, “As the attorney general has maintained throughout the course of litigation, the Legislature was within its constitutional authority to take steps to prevent off-label uses of abortion drugs in order to protect the health and safety of Oklahoma women.”

The legislation is incredibly important because it protects women from the various complications associated with the RU486 abortion drug. In 2011, the Food and Drug Administration reported that 14 women in the U.S. have died from using the mifepristone abortion drug and 2,207 women have been injured by it.

The report stated: “Severe infections generally involve death or hospitalization for at least 2-3 days, intravenous antibiotics for at least 24 hours, total antibiotic usage for at least 3 days, and any other physical or clinical findings, laboratory data or surgery that suggest a severe infection.”

CLICK LIKE IF YOU’RE PRO-LIFE!

In the past, Planned Parenthood distributed the abortion-inducing drugs to women without requiring an in-person visit and significantly past the prescribed date from their last menstrual cycle. In fact, it wasn’t until four California women died within a week of using the abortion drug they received from Planned Parenthood that they changed its policy to conform to the FDA protocol. Initially, Planned Parenthood was telling women to use the abortion drug vaginally even though the FDA indicated oral use is safer for women.

Tragically, the drug has taken the lives of two million unborn children in the United States since its approval at the end of the Clinton administration. Additionally, according to the Center for Disease Control the abortion drug accounts for 16.5 percent of all abortions.

In 2013, Dr. Randy O’Bannon explained the risks involved in a RU-486 abortion:

First-trimester surgical abortions are completed in a matter of minutes. But abortions using drugs such RU-486 (mifepristone) and the second drug (a prostaglandin) take days, maybe a week or more. They employ at least two drugs, are supposed to involve three trips to the doctor’s office over a two week period, and typically come with a great deal of pain, bleeding, and a host of other unpleasant side effects. There is a significant chance they will not work. Nineteen women taking it have ended up dead and over 600 have ended up in the hospital.

RU-486 works by blocking the effect of progesterone, the pregnancy hormone that signals the woman’s body that she is pregnant and makes sure her reproductive system is set to welcome and nurture the young child. With that signal stymied, the baby’s life support system shuts down. The baby starves to death, and the woman’s body, failing to recognize the child’s presence, initiates the shedding of the rich nutrient lining of the uterus the way it does during the normal menstrual process when there is no baby present.

By itself, though, RU486 is not always powerful enough to expel the tiny corpse. A second drug, a prostaglandin such as misoprostol, is given to stimulate powerful uterine contractions to expel the child and complete the abortion. It is intensely painful and often very bloody.

Few women realize that a woman loses more blood from a chemical abortion than a surgical one. And the pain and cramping can go on for hours, and the bleeding can go on for weeks. Side effects like nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea are often part of the package.

ru48614b