May 1, 2025
Natashia Wright, Associate Director and Client Service Leader, Benefits Compliance
Following recent legislative changes and the overturning of Roe v. Wade, several states have introduced legislative measures to restrict access to abortion medications. These legislative proposals include classifying mifepristone and misoprostol as controlled substances and limiting telehealth prescriptions for these medications. Medical experts caution that such restrictions could negatively impact patients who require these pills for non-abortion-related treatments and services.
Employer Action Items
- Stay Informed: Stay informed about the latest state and federal legislative changes concerning abortion medication and the classification of these pharmaceuticals as controlled substances.
- Engage Consultants and Experts: Consult with brokers and engage legal counsel to learn how these modifications might affect your organization’s total rewards platform, and specifically, your core healthcare benefit offerings.
- Evaluate and Update: Evaluate and update healthcare policies to ensure they align with state laws and to ensure that they provide necessary support for employees needing mifepristone and misoprostol for both abortion-related (if covered) and non-abortion-related treatments and services.
- Communicate with Stakeholders: Communicate with employees and organizational leadership regarding any changes to the organization’s healthcare policies and for purposes of providing the necessary resources to employees to ensure they have access to any required pharmaceutical interventions.
Summary
In the wake of Roe v. Wade’s overturning, some states have devised legislative proposals designed to prohibit the dispensing of medication designed to induce an abortion. Legislators have introduced legislation aiming to classify mifepristone and misoprostol (a safe and common two-pill regimen prescribed to induce an abortion) as controlled substances. Generally, by reclassifying these two medications as controlled substances, states seek to criminalize the possession of these medications, absent a valid prescription. Medical experts warn that restricting access could harm patients needing these medications for non-abortion-related treatments and services.
Recently introduced state-level legislative measures aim to restrict abortion medication access in states with currently existing abortion bans. In some states like Louisiana, related legislation has been enacted into law, creating state-level legal restrictions upon the dispensing of these medications. However, in both Indiana and Mississippi, recent attempts at mirroring Louisiana’s legislative pursuits dissolved without the enactment of new legislation.
In the latest surge of civil lawsuits, restrictions on medical abortion at the state level have been met with a strong defense of these drugs and the healthcare providers who prescribe them. This is often done through telehealth consultations with individuals residing outside the state. Notable cases include New York State’s defense of a New York physician who is facing allegations of illegal dispensing of controlled substances (having dispensed mifepristone and misoprostol to out-of-state patients in Texas and Louisiana).
Texas Attorney General Paxton’s lawsuit against the aforementioned New York resident physician brings light to the broader political and legal conflicts existing relative to the out-of-state prescribing of abortion medication. In response, additional states are contemplating challenging existing federal regulatory requirements which presently permit the prescribing of medication abortion via telehealth physician encounters offered to out-of-state residents.
Texas Federal District Court Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, who previously halted the approval of one of the nation’s safest and most common medication abortion methodologies, recently held that Idaho, Kansas, and Missouri may avoid enforcement of federal rules related to patient access to mifepristone, when prescribed via a telehealth encounter with an out-of-state physician. These and other states are actively seeking to prohibit the telehealth prescribing of these medications, or, in the alternative, to prohibit dispensing of the drug after the first seven weeks of a pregnancy. Additionally, some states seek to impose requirements for up to three in-patient office visits with a physician prior to the lawful dispensing of the medication abortion regimen. Similar challenges may lead to parallel restrictions, as applied to mifepristone access throughout the United States.
Additional Information & Resources
- Supreme Court rejects challenge to abortion drug mifepristone
- H.R.767: Protecting Access to Medication Abortion Act of 2023
- What to know about state proposals to ban abortion pills and punish women who seek to end pregnancies
For more information
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