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Two Women Die After Using Abortion Pill By ANDREW BRIDGES, Associated Press

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Two Women Die After Using Abortion Pill By ANDREW BRIDGES,

Associated Press Writer

Fri Mar 17, 6:57 PM ET

 

 

 

WASHINGTON - Two more women have died after using the abortion pill

RU-486, regulators said Friday in a warning that brought renewed

calls for pulling the controversial drug from the market.

 

 

The organization that provided the pill to the two women said it

would immediately stop disregarding the approved instructions for

the pill's use.

 

The Food and Drug Administration warned doctors to watch for a rare

but deadly infection previously implicated in four deaths of women

who had taken the drug. The drug, also called Mifeprex or

mifepristone, has not been proved to be the cause in any of those

cases.

 

Nor has the FDA confirmed the cause of the latest two deaths.

However, in one of them, the woman's symptoms appeared to resemble

those in the cluster of four cases in California where the women

died from an infection of the bloodstream, or sepsis. Those women

did not follow FDA-approved instructions for the pill-triggered

abortion, which requires swallowing three tablets of one drug,

followed by two of another two days later.

 

Instead of swallowing the final two tablets, the second course of

pills was inserted vaginally in the four women, an " off-label " use

that studies have shown effective and that has been recommended by a

majority of the nation's abortion clinics. That use does not have

federal approval though studies have indicated it produces fewer

side effects.

 

It was not immediately known if the second course of pills had been

inserted vaginally in the two latest women to die, an FDA

spokeswoman said. She declined to be identified, saying she was not

authorized to speak publicly about the issue.

 

Two Senate abortion foes, Republicans Jim DeMint of South Carolina

and Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, urged passage of legislation that would

suspend sales of RU-486 until the Government Accountability Office

reviews how the FDA approved the pill.

 

" RU-486 is a deadly drug that is killing pregnant women, " DeMint

said. " This drug should never have been approved, and it must be

suspended immediately. "

 

Monty Patterson, a California man whose 18-year-old daughter, Holly,

died in 2003 after taking the abortion pill, also said the drug

should be pulled from the market. The Senate bill is informally

called " Holly's Law. "

 

" The bottom line is that this is not about the abortion debate. This

is about the safety, health and welfare of women, " Patterson said.

 

Meanwhile, Planned Parenthood Federation of America Inc. said it

would immediately stop recommending vaginal insertion of the final

course of pills. Four of the women who died, including the latest

two, received the pills at Planned Parenthood-affiliated clinics,

said Dr. Vanessa Cullins, the organization's vice president for

medical affairs. Planned Parenthood estimates RU-486 has been used

560,000 times in the U.S. since it was approved.

 

RU-486 is sold by Danco Laboratories and is approved to terminate

pregnancy up to 49 days after the beginning of the latest menstrual

cycle. It blocks a hormone required to sustain a pregnancy. When

followed two days later by another medicine, misoprostol, to induce

contractions, the pregnancy is terminated.

 

Danco said it was reviewing information about the cases as it

becomes available.

 

The FDA previously has said the abortion pill remains safe enough to

stay on the market. The rate of sepsis is about one in 100,000 uses,

comparable to infection risks with surgical abortions and

childbirth.

 

At least seven U.S. women have died after taking the pill, sold

since 2000. The other U.S. death associated with Mifeprex was the

2001 case of a ruptured ectopic, or tubal, pregnancy. The drug is

not to be used in those cases, in which the fertilized egg implants

outside the uterus.

 

In the California cases, all four women tested positive for

Clostridium sordellii, a common but rarely fatal bacterium.

 

Federal health officials plan a May 11 workshop in Atlanta to

discuss emerging cases of disease involving the germ, which also

have included infections in patients who have received skin grafts.

_________________

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JoAnn Guest

mrsjoguest

www.geocities.com/mrsjoguest/Diets

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