Indiana’s Attorney General Todd Rokita is joining 13 other states in calling on the Environmental Protection Agency to put tighter restrictions on the abortion-inducing drug mifepristone. The claim is that it poses a risk to the water supply.
“Drug-induced abortions occurring outside of the legal, direct and personal care of a properly licensed physician are causing pain and suffering to women,” Attorney General Rokita said in a statement. “Obviously, this starts with the individuals persuaded by Planned Parenthood and Big Pharma to use mifepristone to abort their pregnancies, but increasingly it extends to other women who might ingest the drug from their local water supplies.”
Rokita signed on to a letter outlining that at-home chemical abortions have been on the rise, and claimed that this has resulted in a risk to the water supply. The letter further claims women,particularly other pregnant women, could have health complications if mifepristone reaches a certain concentration.
But medical experts say the claims are without evidence and are part of a continued effort to limit abortion access.
Caitlin Bernard, an OBGYN in Indianapolis, said the science does not back up the claims.
“There's certainly no data, for example, to suggest that trace amounts of mifepristone in drinking water would induce an abortion, cause complications in a pregnancy,” she said.
Bernard said the Attorney General’s claims are ultimately about targeting an abortion inducing-drug he disagrees with - not about wider health concerns.
“I don't know how many, you know, maybe hundreds of 1000s of medications are approved by the FDA for use in the United States, and this is the only one that anybody is concerned about being in the water supply,” she said.
A newly proposed list of water contaminants by the federal government does include some pharmaceuticals for the first time. That list does not include mifepristone.
Prescribing mifepristone for an abortion is currently illegal in Indiana due to the state’s near-total abortion ban, but state lawmakers are trying to find ways to penalize prescribers from outside Indiana.
That got harder earlier this year when the U.S. Supreme Court allowed access to mifepristone via telehealth to remain intact.
Some Indiana residents are likely getting abortion inducing-drugs through the mail, although state officials have not been able to provide any data on how much that is happening.
“They can't keep people from accessing [mifepristone] the way that they want to, whether it's through telehealth, whether it's through coming into clinic and seeing their provider, and so they are just grasping for new angles,” said Ishana Shetty, with the Indiana chapter of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
Shetty said mifepristone has withstood repeated tests of its safety and efficacy, and the allegations from Rokita are “frankly ridiculous.”
“This is one of the most over-regulated medications that is available in the market, and has repeatedly proven itself to be safe, be effective, and okay for people to take,” she said.
Contact Government Reporter Benjamin Thorp at bthorp@wfyi.org
