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Oklahoma County District Judge Don Andrews issued a temporary injunction against a state abortion law on Wednesday, one that requires abortion facilities to inform women the effects of medication abortion drugs can be reversed if they change their minds after initiating the procedure.
Medication abortions involve two medications, the first of which is mifepreistone. This medication stops a women’s uterus from being able to absorb progesterone, which is needed for the pregnancy to continue. This pill will also loosen the cervix, making it incompetent. Two days after taking the first pill, women would then receive the second round of medication, misoprostol, which causes contractions, leading to delivery of the unborn baby.
The abortion pill reversal is only effective after the first medication, but not the second.
Though the law does not present “undue” burdens on women seeking to obtain abortions, pro-abortion activists challenged the law, claiming it violates doctors’ free speech rights.
Jill Webb, legal director of the ACLU of Oklahoma, said, “Not only do you have freedom of speech to say what you want, you also can’t be compelled to say something you don’t believe, and that’s what the problem is.”
But asking doctors to inform women of their alternative options should not be viewed as a violation of belief systems or free speech rights. It is, indeed, a fact that the abortion pill can be reversed in many cases, and the law simply ensures women are aware of this option.
Not so, according to pro-abortion activists, who claim the notion of abortion reversal is “junk science.” The studies on the reversal have been limited, and pro-abortionists claim they are inconclusive without the use of “control groups.” The doctor behind the studies, Dr. George Delgado, observes it would be unethical to implement control groups for such studies, but their absence is enough for pro-abortionists to decry the studies as substandard.
Perhaps more importantly, however, according to the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the abortion reversal pill is not only safe but also “significantly more effective” than “seeing what happens” after taking the first abortion pill but not taking the second.
The best evidence that abortion reversals are not “bogus” is the fact that more than 700 babies have been saved as a result of the reversal pills, according to Heartbeat International. The success rate remains at about 65 percent, so while it is far from certain, it clearly has the capacity to save many lives.
Attorneys for the state cited these statistics in their arguments before Judge Andrews.
“It hurts women in Oklahoma not having this disclosure,” Oklahoma Assistant Solicitor General Bryan Cleveland told the judge.
According to State Rep. Mark Lepak, who wrote the bill, the measure offers further protections to women by ensuring they are presented with all options.
“A number of women have regret after the abortion. They may have a regret during the process but, if they don’t know there may be a way to reverse the process, then they just don’t know,” Lepak told Oklahoma News 4. “There are a lot of things in this world that, once you make a decision, you can’t undo. This is perhaps one that you can change your mind and you still have some hope that you could deliver a happy, healthy baby.”
Judge Andrews’ ruling does not address the merits of the law itself, but prevents the law from going into effect on November 1, a point emphasized by Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter.
“The judge didn’t rule on the merits of the case and only decided to retain the status quo moving forward, pending more evidence,” Hunter said in a statement after the judge’s ruling. “The state remains committed to defending this law that requires doctors to inform women they can opt to reverse the process of a medical abortion.”
Oklahoma is not the only state to enact this type of law. Life News reports seven other states — Arkansas, Arizona, South Dakota, Utah, Idaho, Nebraska, North Dakota, and Kentucky — have similar laws in effect. North Dakota has enacted a similar bill, but it is not currently in effective, after a federal judge blocked it, claiming it would “violate a physician’s right not to speak and go far beyond any informed consent laws addressed by the United States Supreme Court.”
Graphic: magicmine/iStock/Getty Images Plus
