CVS and Walgreens plan to offer abortion pills where abortion is legal

The two chains have announced that they will begin the certification process under a new F.D.A. regulations that will allow retail pharmacies to distribute prescription pills for the first time.

Two major drugstore chains will apply to sell abortion pills under a new Food and Drug Administration rule that will allow the drug to be offered by retail pharmacies for the first time.

The chains, CVS and Walgreens, have said they plan to seek certification to sell the pill, mifepristone, the first pill used in the two-drug abortion regimen. Patients will still need a prescription from a certified healthcare provider, but the new federal measure could significantly expand access to medical abortion, as it allows any pharmacy that agrees to accept these prescriptions and to meet certain other criteria for distributing the pills in its stores and by mail order.

Pharmacy chains did not provide details on when they expected to be able to offer the pills, in which states or whether they would only offer them in stores or by mail order, or both. They said they would abide by state laws that prohibit or restrict abortion, currently about half of the states. Amy Thibaut, spokesperson for CVS, said.

Walgreens spokesperson Fraser Engerman said in a statement, "We intend to to become a certified pharmacy under the program. We are working on registration, the necessary training of our pharmacists, as well as the evaluation of our network of pharmacies in terms of where we normally distribute products that have an F.D.A. requirements and will exempt them in accordance with federal and state laws. after following the Supreme Court's decision last year striking down the federal abortion law. As conservative states ban or heavily restrict abortion, the pills are increasingly at the center of political and legal battles, and the decision to sell them could make big chains another focus of the contentious debate over abortion. abortion in the country.

The New York Times follows the state of abortion laws in each state following the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.

The steps for pharmacies to be certified to dispense mifepristone are not difficult, but they do involve some administrative requirements that go beyond the process used by pharmacies. pharmacies with most other drugs. , such as appointing an employee to ensure compliance.

For chains like CVS and Walg reens, the most logistically complex step might be l requirement that pharmacies keep confidential the names of certified healthcare providers who prescribe mifepristone to protect their privacy and security.

To fulfill this requirement, a string like CVS wouldn't be able to list a doctor's name in a company-wide database, for example, and would have to limit that information to the store that fills that doctor's prescriptions, according to an official at Danco Laboratories, one of two makers of mifepristone, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the company's concerns about threats from abortion opponents.

Mifepristone, which blocks a hormone needed for development of pregnancy, is cleared by the F.D.A. to be taken during the first 10 weeks of pregnancy, although many clinics and telemedicine providers have started