New York state sues group over abortion pill reversal claims

NEW YORK: New York state’s top prosecutor on Monday sued Heartbeat International, an anti-abortion group, and 11 crisis pregnancy centers, accusing them of misleading and potentially endangering women by claiming that they can provide a treatment reversing the effect of the abortion pill mifepristone.

In the lawsuit, New York Attorney General Letitia James asked a state court in Manhattan to block Heartbeat International and the centers, located across New York state and whose mission is to discourage women from having abortions, from advertising abortion pill reversal on their websites or anywhere else and award an unspecified amount of money damages.

“Abortions cannot be reversed,” James said in a statement. “Any treatments that claim to do so are made without scientific evidence and could be unsafe.”Heartbeat International did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Mifepristone is the first part of a two-drug regimen used for medication abortion, which is approved by the US Food and Drug Administration to terminate pregnancy in the first 10 weeks. Medication abortion accounted for more than 60 percent of US abortions last year. Proponents of medication abortion reversal say mifepristone’s effects can be blocked by a high dose of the hormone progesterone. There are no controlled clinical trials showing the procedure is safe or effective, and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists says that it is not supported by science. New York’s lawsuit comes as the US Supreme Court considers a case brought by abortion opponents seeking to restrict the availability of mifepristone nationwide.