A federal judge in the US state of Texas has suspended the license to use the abortion pill. As a result, its use can be banned nationwide. But in Washington, the court decided just the opposite shortly afterwards.
The Texas judge’s ruling is a “preliminary injunction.” The US Department of Justice has already said it will appeal the ruling.
Four anti-abortion groups and four anti-abortion doctors had brought the case. They sued the US medical regulator FDA in November. According to the plaintiffs, insufficient account was taken of the risks for girls under the age of eighteen who use the abortion pill mifepristone. This drug was approved in 2000 and is used to terminate a pregnancy within the first ten weeks.
Not long after the Texas judge ruled, the federal judge in Washington decided the opposite. Seventeen states had actually requested that the FDA’s approval not be changed.
President Joe Biden called the Texas federal judge’s decision on Friday an “unprecedented step in taking away basic freedoms from women.” The approval of the drug was sufficiently supported by science, according to the government. Biden’s government is going to challenge the case.
