A court in Texas has suspended the approval of the use of a key drug used in medication abortions in the United States.
The ruling has put on hold the authorisation of mifepristone which was granted about 20 years ago by the regulator for drugs and medicines in the US, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
US district judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, however, paused the implementation of his ruling for a week pending an appeal which is likely to be lodged quickly by the Biden administration.
The ruling is the most significant case regarding abortion in the US since the supreme court in Washington overturned the federal constitutional right to abortion last summer.
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The mifepristone case is likely to end up ultimately before the supreme court in Washington.
The judge in a ruling on Friday said the court did not second-guess FDA’s decision-making lightly.
“But here, FDA acquiesced on its legitimate safety concerns - in violation of its statutory duty - based on plainly unsound reasoning and studies that did not support its conclusions.”
The case was brought by a group known as the Alliance Defending Freedom on behalf of four anti-abortion medical organisations.
Mifepristone is the first of a two-drug regimen that is used to terminate a pregnancy of up to 10 weeks’ gestation. More than half of abortions in the US are medication abortions.
