Newssites.org
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A group of doctors opposed to abortion he asked the Supreme Court this Tuesday to restrict access to a key abortion drug while other legal challenges unfold, as a Wednesday night deadline approaches for the court to act.
The filing means that after the Justice Department files a response expected Tuesday night or Wednesday morning, the court can rule at any time as the legal battle over mifepristone continues, nearly two weeks after a federal judge in Texas said the drug should not have been approved. in the year 2000.
Last week, Justice Samuel Alito granted a request by the Biden administration and a manufacturer of the drug to temporarily suspend the decision to give the justices more time to review the case. Alito asked to hear from the doctors and said the court would make its final determination at 11:59 p.m. ET Wednesday.
In the filing, the doctors asked the courts to ultimately deny the Biden administration’s request, arguing that for “almost a quarter of a century” the government and a manufacturer of the drug “have blatantly flouted applicable law and regulations , ignoring holes and red flags in their own safety data, willfully evaded judicial review and continually placed politics above women’s health.”
Erik C. Baptist, a lawyer for the doctors, said the US Food and Drug Administration had not done enough to study the drug’s safety.
“Over decades, the agency has removed all meaningful and necessary safeguards about chemical abortion, demonstrating a callous disregard for women’s well-being, unborn life, and legal limits.”
He said the government’s argument amounted to a “falling-from-the-sky argument that compares chemical abortion to drugs like ibuprofen” and that lower court rulings restricting access to the drug were “painful decisions ” which, he argued, “only”. require the agency to comply with the law. ”