(LifeSiteNews) — A recently published investigation detailed how dozens of websites are shipping abortion pills to states where the killing of unborn children is illegal without requiring a prescription or age verification.
None of these abortion drug providers appear to face legal challenges, the Daily Wire found, despite the fact that U.S. law continues to require that abortion pill providers verify prescriptions and despite their violations of state laws that nearly totally ban abortions.
In fact, media outlets such as Ms. Magazine have openly lauded such abortion pill providers for allowing women to abort their unborn children in states where this is illegal, and not requiring prescriptions. Since the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) loosened abortion pill distribution regulations in 2023, women have been able to obtain drugs like mifepristone via telemedicine without verifying how many weeks pregnant they are.
The pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute recently published new research finding that 63 percent of abortions in 2023 were conducted via pills, continuing a steady rise from zero percent since 2000, when the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) first approved mifepristone for abortion. Considering that this data only included official numbers from health institutions, the percentage of abortions performed via pill is likely considerably higher.
The Supreme Court heard oral arguments last week regarding whether the FDA should reinstate the restrictions on the mailing of mifepristone that were scrapped by the Biden administration. Advocates of the previous regulations frequently argue that abortion pills pose serious risks to women beyond killing their babies, including hemorrhaging, follow-up surgery, and infection. The Charlotte Lozier Institute’s research shows a “53% greater risk for an ER visit for abortion complications than after a surgical abortion.”
Despite the considerable potential of these pills to endanger the lives of women, many abortion pill providers continue to covertly dispense the drugs without regard for whether their recipients are young teens. According to the Daily Wire,the providers “typically direct users to use discreet payment methods” in order to help ensure anonymity, such as cryptocurrencies.
The websites even advise their buyers not to admit to having taken an abortion pill, with one reportedly warning, “If you go to a hospital or other healthcare facility, do not tell anyone that you took the pills. There is no way for anyone to know you took the pills. Tell them you think you are having a miscarriage.”
These websites are heavily contributing to the reportedly unmitigated prevalence of abortion even after the overturning of Roe v. Wade. Recent Guttmacher Institute research on abortion pills found that “Increased access to and use of medication abortion is likely one reason why the overall number of abortions in the formal health care system increased 10% nationally between 2020 and 2023” — and this is not accounting for covert abortion pill deliveries.
One of the organizations that has been most instrumental in directing teens and women to these illegally operating abortion pill providers is Plan C, which touts itself as “transform(ing) access to abortion in the U.S. by normalizing the self-directed option of abortion pills by mail.” The Plan C website lists abortion pill providers in the U.S. who do not require a prescription and will deliver to any state, regardless of whether abortion is legal there.
“Our Vision: A near future in which the ability to end an early pregnancy is directly in the hands of anyone who seeks it,” the group proclaims on its “About Us” page. Astoundingly, Plan C is able to market itself as featured and promoted by many of the biggest media outlets in existence, including USA Today, The New York Times, CNN, Huffpost, NPR, Bloomberg, TIME, Buzzfeed, Healthline, and Vogue.
The Plan C website advises women who have medical complications from abortion pills that they are not required to tell doctors about their abortions if they go to the hospital.
“Blood tests do not reveal any differences between a miscarriage and a medication abortion,” the site’s FAQ page notes.
Even before the FDA loosened abortion pill restrictions in 2023, at least 23 human rights groups had urged the FDA to ban the abortion pill as an imminent danger to public health.
“When the FDA approves drugs, it analyzes whether the risks of the drug outweigh its benefits. There are no benefits to mifepristone. The ‘successful’ outcome of mifepristone ingestion is a dead child, and the possible side-effects are an injured or dead woman,” the signatories wrote in a letter delivered to then-FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn.
“It is a grave injustice that the FDA approved mifepristone for U.S. distribution under Bill Clinton 20 years ago, and it is 20 years past time that our elected and appointed federal leaders take the necessary action to ban this catastrophic drug within U.S. borders. Stop the killing. Ban the drug.”
The signatories include the leadership of the American College of Pediatricians, American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists, Live Action, Students for Life of America, Samaritan’s Purse, and the Susan B. Anthony List.
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