United States: The Court of Appeal on Thursday has thrown out a lawsuit that sought to address how the US Food and Drug Administration handled the distribution of the abortion pills mifepristone to the American populace, thus making a decision on the matter which makes it possible to ship and use the pills without meeting a doctor.
More about the news
The ruling is a major blow for the anti-abortion camp in the first big Supreme Court judicial decision on reproductive rights since the full obliteration of Roe v. Wade last year.
The court stated that the doctors and anti-abortion groups challenging the most access did not have standing to sue. While the court’s rationale does rely heavily on technical legal precedent, it is significant because it may lead to other efforts to challenge mifepristone.
Justice Kavanaugh, who wrote the opinion for a unanimous court, stated, “We recognize that many citizens, including the plaintiff doctors here, have sincere concerns about and objections to others using mifepristone and obtaining abortions,” as CNN Health reported.
“But citizens and doctors do not have standing to sue simply because others are allowed to engage in certain activities – at least without the plaintiffs demonstrating how they would be injured by the government’s alleged under-regulation of others,” Kavanaugh continued.
Various opinions on a challenge to the drug
The drug challenge has been violently opposed by the pharmaceutical industry, which even warned against the second-guessed regulation ruling for mifepristone. It can also open the door to legal challenges targeting all sorts of medications.
Kavanaugh said, under the constitution, “a plaintiff’s desire to make a drug less available for others does not establish standing to sue.”
“Citizens and doctors who object to what the law allows others to do may always take their concerns to the Executive and Legislative Branches and seek greater regulatory or legislative restrictions on certain activities,” he added.
Moreover, as Kavanaugh stated, “In short, given the broad and comprehensive conscience protections guaranteed by federal law, the plaintiffs have not shown – and cannot show – that FDA’s actions will cause them to suffer any conscience injury,” CNN Health reported.
Additionally, Justice Clarence Thomas made a statement concurrently to bring into light other issues that he had with the anti-abortion groups’ standing claims.
However, the justice department, which had defended the present regulation for the abortion pill, has refrained from commenting immediately on the ruling.
Danco, a mifepristone manufacturer, that had made an effort earlier also defended an access to the drug, and said that it was “pleased with the Supreme Court’s decision in this incredibly important case.”
The Danco spokesperson Abigail Long said that the ruling “maintained the stability of the FDA drug approval process, which is based on the agency’s expertise and on which patients, healthcare providers, and the US pharmaceutical industry rely.”
He added, “The decision also safeguards access to a drug that has decades of safe and effective use,” as CNN Health reported.