Louisiana governor signs bill to classify abortion pills as controlled substances into law

May 25, 2024 Benjamin Hughes

Washington — Louisiana became the first state to classify two abortion-inducing medications as controlled substances, making possession of the pills without a prescription a crime.

Gov. Jeff Landry, a Republican, signed legislation that reclassifies misoprostol and mifepristone — a two-step regimen used to terminate early pregnancies — as Schedule IV drugs into law on Friday after it passed the state legislature earlier this week.

The measure puts the drugs in the same category as opioids, depressants and other drugs that can be addictive, making them harder to obtain. Misoprostol and mifepristone are not classified as controlled substances by the federal government and can be used separately to treat other conditions.

appeared poised to allow the drug to remain widely available.

Last year, more than 60% of abortions within the U.S. healthcare system were done through medication, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights.

Louisiana already bans both medication and surgical abortions except to save the mother’s life or because a pregnancy is “medically futile.”

Kaia Hubbard contributed reporting.

Caitlin Yilek

Caitlin Yilek is a politics reporter at CBSNews.com, based in Washington, D.C. She previously worked for the Washington Examiner and The Hill, and was a member of the 2022 Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellowship with the National Press Foundation.

Source: cbsnews.com