The Supreme Court reenters the contentious legal battle over abortion on Tuesday as it weighs restrictions on the drug that is most widely used in the United States to terminate pregnancies.
The conservative-dominated court, which overturned the constitutional right to abortion nearly two years ago, is to hear oral arguments on access to the abortion pill mifepristone.
Anti-abortion groups are seeking to have the drug banned, claiming that despite its long track record it is unsafe.
Mifepristone was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in 2000 and the FDA estimates that more than 5.9 million Americans have used it to end pregnancies since then.
The case stems from a ruling last year by a conservative US District Court judge in Texas, an appointee of former Republican president Donald Trump, that would have prohibited mifepristone.
A conservative-dominated appeals court overturned the outright ban because the statute of limitations on challenging the FDA’s approval had expired. But the court nonetheless limited access to the drug.
Danco Laboratories, the mifepristone maker, and the administration of Democratic President Joe Biden appealed the lower court’s restrictions on mifepristone to the Supreme Court.
The nation’s highest court, where conservatives wield a 6-3 majority, froze the rulings by the lower court and the drug remains on the market for the time being.
The FDA approved mifepristone for use up to seven weeks of pregnancy in 2000 and further loosened the regulations in 2016, allowing it to be used up to 10 weeks.
It lifted in-person dispensing requirements in 2021, during the Covid pandemic, allowing for the drug to be distributed by mail and prescribed remotely through telemedicine.
The appeals court decision would roll back the legal limit for use of mifepristone to seven weeks, block it from being delivered by mail and require the pill to be prescribed and administered by a doctor.
