The future of the most common method for ending pregnancies hangs in the balance as legal arguments play out (pdf) over whether the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) ignored safety concerns when it approved mifepristone more than two decades ago and exceeded its authority by loosening safeguards with subsequent amendments.
Mifepristone, or “Mifeprex,” is a synthetic steroid that blocks progesterone, a hormone needed for a pregnancy to develop. It is combined with a second drug, misoprostol (marketed as Cytotek)—to end intrauterine pregnancy through 10 weeks of gestation.
