Biden administration to lift abortion pill restriction amid pandemic
CBSN
The Biden administration will temporarily lift a medication abortion restriction that requires abortion pills to be dispensed in person, reversing a Trump-era policy and handing abortion-rights groups one of their first major victories of the new administration.
In a two-page letter letter to the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecologists, a professional medical organization, acting FDA Commissioner Janet Woodcock announced Monday evening that her agency would "exercise enforcement discretion" surrounding the FDA's requirement that abortion patients using mifepristone to terminate a pregnancy obtain the pills in-person from a medical provider. The decision will allow providers in some states to prescribe via telemedicine and send the pills in the mail. Citing four medical publications, Woodcock wrote, "these studies do not appear to show increases in serious safety concerns… occurring with medical abortion as a result of modifyiing the in-person dispensing requirement during the COVID-19 pandemic."Two climbers were waiting to be rescued near the peak of Denali, a colossal mountain that towers over miles of vast tundra in southern Alaska, officials said Wednesday. Originally part of a three-person team that became stranded near the top of the mountain, the climbers put out a distress call more than 30 hours earlier suggesting they were hypothermic and unable to descend on their own, according to the National Park Service.
There's no making up for what Olympic hurdler Lashinda Demus lost on the day she finished .07 seconds behind a Russian opponent who, everyone later learned, was doping. What the American 400-meter hurdles champion will finally receive is a great day under the Eiffel Tower where she'll be presented with the gold medal she was denied 12 years ago at the London Olympics.