WOMEN’S AND DOCTORS’ GROUPS FILE COMPLAINT WITH FDA OVER RU-486

WASHINGTON, August 21, 2002 (LSN.ca) – Physicians’ and women’s groups yesterday filed documents with the Food and Drug Administration calling on the agency to shelve the chemical abortifacient RU-486 pending a thorough review of its own approval process and the subsequent deaths and complications attributed to the abortion drug.  The Christian Medical Association (CMA, www.cmdahome.org) joined Concerned Women for America and the American Association of Pro Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists in filing a 90-page “citizens petition” based on 22 months of research. Using information obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests, the document chronicles how political pressure corrupted the normally objective FDA drug review process and in the process endangered the health and lives of women who use the drug.  Since the agency approved the RU-486 abortifacient in September 2000, the drug has been blamed for deaths, severe hemorrhaging, serious bacterial infections and heart attacks.  “This document outlines the significant health and safety concerns that have emerged after several years’ experience with RU-486,” noted Dr. David Hager, a Kentucky obstetrician and CMA member who assisted with the petition. “Women deserve a full and objective accounting of a drug’s dangers based on sound and complete medical evidence.”  The evidence presented in the 90-page “citizen petition” has particular implications for states like California, where the just-passed Reproductive Privacy Act (S.B. 1301) would even allow non-physicians to administer the powerful chemical abortifacient.  See the release from the Christian Medical Association:  https://www.cmdahome.org/?CONTEXT=art&cat=221&art=1516&BISKIT=&controlfield=season&unitid=6155#BC_unit6155