FDA taking another look at use of challenged abortion drug

There was a court case that challenged the approval by the Food and Drug Administration of the use of mifepristone, the abortion drug that is widely used as a replacement for surgical abortions.

The Supreme Court ruled that the drug should be available, but the ruling was on very narrow grounds, and was based only on the court’s claim the pro-life physicians who brought to challenge didn’t show they had been harmed personally because it would be others who actually used the drug.

Now there’s going to be a new review of the drug by the FDA itself.

FDA chief Marty Makary just committed to me to do a full review of the chemical abortion drug’s safety: “As Commissioner of Food and Drugs, I am committed to conducting a review of mifepristone” pic.twitter.com/nMxUhE18UA

— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) June 3, 2025

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., who has advocated for tighter controls over the use of such chemicals, posted on social media that the FDA chief, Marty Makary, “just committed to me to do a full review of the chemical abortion drug’s safety.”

Makary said, in fact, the FDA “continues to closely monitor the postmarketing safety data on mifepristone for the medical termination of early pregnancy.”

“I am committed to conducting a review of mifepristone and working with the professional career scientists at the agency who review this data,” Makary said. He explained mifepristone remains the subject of “pending litigation,” and the FDA doesn’t comment on such matters, so he cannot provide more details now.

A report in the Washington Examiner said Hawley has been pushing for the FDA to take such action.

“The review comes after Hawley and anti-abortion groups slammed Makary in April after he said he had ‘no plans to take action’ regarding FDA regulations on mifepristone that have allowed healthcare providers to ship the abortifacient to patients in other states, irrespective of state laws prohibiting elective abortions,” the report explained.

Those actions, by abortion businesses who sell and ship drugs even to states which have abortion limits following the Supreme Court’s rejection of the faulty Roe abortion standard that was used for years, have been exploding.

There have been problems because drugs shipped into a state with those limits don’t always comply with that state’s abortion restrictions.

In chemical abortions, mifepristone blocks the hormone progesterone, causing the death of the unborn child.

The FDA in 2016 made its rules on the drug lax, allowing its use for chemical abortions and no longer requiring abortionists involved to report complications.

Then Joe Biden removed in-person screening requirements for patients to obtain the medication, allowing healthcare providers to ship mifepristone to patients in other states without a physical consultation.

But the report noted a study from the Ethics and Public Policy Center pointing out that “severe complications” from the abortion drug use is “22 times higher than FDA data indicate.”

When the Supreme Court ruled on the dispute over the lethal drug regarding the physician plaintiffs, several state attorneys general said they would continue the case on their own.