Wyoming has become the first US state to ban abortion pills. Governor Mark Gordon signed legislation banning the use or prescription of such pills.
Wyoming lawmakers passed the legislation in March. One of the articles prohibits “prescribing, issuing, distributing, selling or using any drug for the purpose of performing an abortion”. The law will come into effect on July 1, the BBC reports.
These morning-after pills, prescription contraceptive pills, which are used after intercourse and before pregnancy can be confirmed, are exempt from the ban.
The measure also includes an exception for any treatment necessary to protect the woman”from an immediate danger that significantly threatens her life or health“, as well as any treatment “natural miscarriage according to currently accepted medical guidelines“.
Republican Governor Gordon also announced that he would also allow the enactment of a separate law without his signature, which would ban routine abortion procedures, except when necessary to protect the health and life of the mother or in cases of rape or incest. Termination of pregnancy due to a fatal fetal defect is also an exception.
Director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Wyoming (ACLU) Antonio Serrano reacted critically to the law and announced that “a person’s health, not politics, should guide important health decisions – including the decision to have an abortion“.
Wyoming, with a population of half a million, has only one clinic that performs abortions. The state is one of many in a legal battle to ban abortion after the Supreme Court overturned the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that allowed abortion at the federal level.
In Texas, they decide to ban the sale of mifepristone
Meanwhile, a Texas court is deciding whether the abortion pill mifepristone can continue to be sold. Mifepristone can be taken at home and is used in more than half of all pregnancy terminations in the US. Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk is expected to make a decision these days that could have a decisive impact on the sale of mifepristone throughout the United States.
The request to ban the sale was filed by a Texas abortion group that claims the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) never properly reviewed the drug’s safety before approving it. President Joe Biden’s administration, on the other hand, maintains that the science adequately supported the approval of mifepristone.
Source: Rtvslo
