Biden Seeks More Info on Medication Abortion Barriers

WASHINGTON — President Biden signed an executive order Sunday giving three members of his cabinet 2 months to report to a White House task force on the barriers U.S. women face when trying to receive a medication abortion.

“Since the day of the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, President Biden has emphasized the need to protect access to mifepristone, a drug used in medication abortion that has been approved by the FDA for over 20 years and accounts for the majority of all abortions in the United States,” the White House said in a fact sheet. “Some state officials have taken steps to try to prevent women from legally accessing medication abortion and to discourage pharmacies from becoming certified by the FDA. Today, President Biden will sign a Presidential Memorandum to further protect access to medication abortion.”

Previously, patients could only be prescribed mifepristone during an in-person visit, but during the COVID-19 pandemic, the FDA eased the rules to allow the drug to be prescribed via telehealth. In addition, a change to the Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy (REMS) for mifepristone announced by the FDA this month permanently removed the in-person dispensing requirement, President Biden noted in a memo Sunday to the attorney general and the secretaries of Health and Human Services and Homeland Security.

“Additionally, pharmacies can now choose to become certified to dispense mifepristone to patients,” he wrote. “These changes seek to reduce the burden on the healthcare delivery system while ensuring the benefits of the medication outweigh the risks. These changes also help ensure that patients can access mifepristone similarly to how they would access other prescribed medications.”

“In the wake of the new REMS for mifepristone, there have been reports of efforts to suppress access to medication abortion,” the president continued. “Some state officials have announced that they will impose restrictions to limit access to this evidence-based, safe, and effective medication.”

“In a letter to the FDA, for example, 22 state attorneys general threatened to enforce state laws that purport to interfere with access to mifepristone,” the memo said. “In Florida, the governor recently said that major pharmacy chains in the state will not offer mifepristone. Florida health officials issued guidance discouraging pharmacies from dispensing mifepristone, claiming that State law limits where abortion medication can be provided to hospitals, clinics, or physician offices. These actions have stoked confusion, sowed fear, and may prevent patients from accessing safe and effective FDA-approved medication.”

Biden’s executive order directed the attorney general and the two secretaries to consider issuing guidance for patients seeking legal access to mifepristone, and for pharmacies and other providers who want to dispense the drug. He also ordered them to provide to the White House’s Interagency Task Force on Reproductive Healthcare Access within 60 days information on “potential barriers faced by patients seeking legal access to mifepristone or other reproductive healthcare, as well as by providers and entities, including pharmacies,” that provide the drug, and to report on “whether any additional institutional resources may be necessary to address these barriers.”

Also on Sunday, Vice President Harris spoke in Tallahassee, Florida at an event to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion nationwide; that decision was overturned in June by the Dobbs decision, which returned regulation of abortion to the states. Abortion is currently unavailable in 14 states, and courts have temporarily blocked enforcement of bans in eight others as of Dec. 12, 2022, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a pro-abortion rights research and policy organization.

“Today, on what would have been its 50th anniversary, we speak of the Roe decision in the past tense,” Harris said. “Because last June the United States Supreme Court took away that constitutional right, a fundamental right, a basic freedom, from the people of America, from the women of America. The court’s action has meant already that many dedicated doctors and nurses now lose their ability to care for their patients — that providers go to jail just for doing their job. And that patients are denied critical care, and even fear that they will be punished simply for seeking care.”

“The right of every woman in every state in the country to make decisions about her own body is on the line,” Harris said. “Republicans in Congress are now calling for an abortion ban at the moment of conception nationwide. How dare they?”

“America is the land of the free and the home of the brave,” she said. “But let us ask: can we truly be free if a woman cannot make decisions about her own body? Can we truly be free if a doctor cannot care for her patients? Can we truly be free if families cannot make intimate decisions about the course of their own lives?”

Pro-life groups panned Harris’s speech. “The Biden-Harris agenda of abortion on demand up to the moment of birth is deeply out of touch in the Dobbs era,” SBA Pro-Life America President Marjorie Dannenfelser said in a statement. “The strong majority of Americans reject pro-abortion extremism … Vice President Harris could not have set up a starker contrast between the radical abortion lobby and the compassion and common sense of the American people.”