FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—A conservative think tank is seeking to hold Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to his commitment to review the safety and efficacy of the abortion pill.
“I’ve asked Marty Makary, who’s the director of [the Food and Drug Administration], to do a complete review, and to report back,” Kennedy said at a May 14 Senate committee hearing.
Advancing American Freedom, a conservative think tank founded by former Vice President Mike Pence, thanked Kennedy for his pledge to review mifepristone in light of the new Ethics and Public Policy Center report showing 11% of women “experience sepsis, infection, hemorrhaging, or another serious adverse event within 45 days following a mifepristone abortion.”
Kennedy called the study “alarming” and said “at the very least, the label should be changed.”
AAF filed a public records request for documents Congress had requested about mifepristone in 1996, and the think tank received no response.
“We believe the documents requested by Congress long ago still exist, even though they may never have been produced to Congress,” the letter to Kennedy said.
“As you undertake a comprehensive review of mifepristone, we believe that the documents we are seeking will be critical to the understanding of the legal shortcuts undertaken by FDA that led to the approval of a drug with a much more dangerous adverse event profile than publicly acknowledged by your predecessors at HHS and FDA,” the letter continues.
In April 2021, the FDA stopped requiring that abortion drugs be dispensed to women in person, which allowed women to receive them through telehealth appointments and by mail.
