BOSTON – The Massachusetts Board of Registration in Pharmacy (BORP) issued guidance to all pharmacies statewide on Wednesday to clarify regulations related to the drug Mifepristone, also sold under the brand name of Mifeprex.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Mifeprex in 2000 and the generic version, Mifepristone, in 2009. According to the FDA, the drug was approved “in a regimen with misoprostol, to end an intrauterine pregnancy through ten weeks gestation (70 days or less since the first day of a patient’s last menstrual period).”
The drug is used in about half of abortions nationwide.
The guidance to pharmacies clarified that all pharmacies in and pharmacy departments Massachusetts have a regulatory obligation and are required to stock and/or procure all reproductive health medications and dispense those medications when presented with a valid prescription.
Twenty Attorneys General around the country have signed letters calling on pharmacies in their state to refuse to distribute Mifepristone.
Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, a federal court judge in Amarillo, Texas, will soon issue a ruling in a case that seeks to overturn the FDA approval of the drug. According to the Texas Tribune, Kacsmaryk was deputy counsel for the First Liberty Institute, a deeply conservative religious liberty law firm in Plano, Texas, before being appointed a federal judge by President Donald Trump in 2019.
“Here in Massachusetts, we will always protect access to reproductive care, including abortion,” said Governor Maura Healey. “At a time when states are rushing to ban medication abortion and some pharmacies are irresponsibly restricting access to it, we are reminding Massachusetts pharmacies that they have an obligation to provide critical reproductive health medications, including Mifepristone. It’s safe, effective, and legal.”
“Our regulations require pharmacies to stock and/or procure all prescriptions necessary to meet the needs of the community, and we interpret that to include all reproductive health medications, including Mifepristone,” said Public Health Commissioner Margret Cooke, who issued the guidance. “This is consistent with our standards as they relate to other basic though controversial medications, including naloxone.”
