New Texas Law Could Lead To Women Buying Abortion Pills In Mexico
If the restrictive Texas abortion law passed on Friday survives legal challenges, health experts are worried that low-income women may turn to Mexico for "abortion pills".
According to the Times, women commonly request pills to "make their periods come back" from Mexican pharmacists, who sell the drug misprostol in generic or name brand form. The drug induces miscarriages, and according to the Times is openly available in Mexico for as little $35. The pill is also apparently covertly available in Texas flea markets. However, absent from these transaction is any proper medical advice.
When asked how women should use the pills, some of the pharmacists said they did not know and others recommended wildly different regimes that doctors say could be unsafe.
Apparently when used properly, misprostol induces miscarriages about 85 percent of the time. However, women who do not take it properly can suffer serious bleeding or a partial abortion.
The recently passed law is some of the strictest anti-abortion legislation in the country, and would almost certainly force many of Texas's clinics to close. The law bans abortions after 20 weeks and holds clinics to hospital surgical standards that opponents of the law say are designed to put financial pressure on abortion clinics.
The law also addresses the use of drugs like misoprostol, requiring the drug to be administered in surgery centers and at what doctors call "outdated dosages."
