Free Republic

Source: Annals of Pharmacotherapy 12/27/05 First Analysis Of FDA's Mifepristone Adverse Event Reports The abortion drug mifepristone (Mifeprex,TM RU-486), initially touted as a more convenient alternative to surgical abortion, has been linked to serious adverse reactions, including several deaths in otherwise healthy women. In "Analysis of Severe Adverse Events Related to the Use of Mifepristone as an Abortifacient," researchers Margaret M Gary MD and Donna J Harrison MD provide an in-depth study of mifepristone adverse event data gathered through the FDA's Adverse Event Reporting System. Their research is available now at The Annals of Pharmacotherapy Online (www.theannals.com) and will appear...

Scientists have pinpointed the deadly bacterium responsible for the death of four US women who underwent abortion induced by prescription medications. Medical experts now warn that such procedures might carry a greater mortality risk than surgical abortions. Women often opt to take the so-called 'abortion pill' mifepristone, which is approved for use in early pregnancy, for privacy reasons; they can receive it from a doctor without having to visit an abortion clinic. Some women taking the medication also say that drug-induced termination feels more natural than the prospect of a surgical procedure. Although mifepristone first became available in Europe in...

An abortion doctor who has been the target of protests for years has been cleared by state regulators in the death of a mentally retarded Texas woman who received a late-term abortion at his clinic. The Kansas Board of Healing Arts, which regulates doctors, concluded after a nine-month investigation that Dr. George Tiller complied with the law and with health care standards in performing the procedure on the 19-year-old woman. Abortion opponents have accused Tiller or his staff of causing the woman's death, which happened in January, days after she visited his Wichita clinic. Larry Buening, the board's executive director,...

Federal drug regulators have discovered that all four women in this country who died after taking an abortion pill suffered from a rare and highly lethal bacterial infection, a finding that is leading to new scrutiny of the drug's safety. Since all four deaths occurred in California, an unusual clustering, the Food and Drug Administration quietly tested to see if abortion pills distributed in California were somehow contaminated. They were not. Stumped, officials from the F.D.A. and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have decided to convene a scientific meeting early next year to discuss this medical mystery,...

I have written only a handful of columns that required fighting back the tears. This is one of them. I got a call last Thursday from a colleague-in-arms asking me for help. He wanted me to write the story I am about to tell because it has been buried by a conspiratorial level of silence rooted in political and media bias. This is the story about an incredibly loving young girl named Christin. A very active high-school graduate and a beloved member of her softball team and community, she was sweet beyond the norm as so often is the case...

Despite the fact that four women in California have died from infections related to the use of mifepristone also known as RU 486, leading advocates of abortion are denouncing calls to take the potentially fatal drug off the market. Their argument… “It’s still safer than having a baby.” Read More... Craig DeLuz Visit The Home of Uncommon Sense... www.craigdeluz.com

Health officials are investigating whether there are any links in the cases of four California women — at least two in Los Angeles County — who have died since 2003 of massive infection after taking the so-called abortion pill, RU-486, and a follow-up drug. The state and federal probe follows an announcement last month by the Food and Drug Administration, after the June death of a Sherman Oaks woman, warning doctors and patients of the potential for serious bacterial infection under certain circumstances. At the heart of the inquiry in California are why and how the deadly infections developed and...

LOS ANGELES - Federal health investigators are baffled: Why have four California women died from a bloodstream infection after using a controversial abortion pill? "On the surface, this appears unusual," said Dr. Marc Fischer, a medical epidemiologist at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. "That's why we're investigating." Two of the deaths -- one this year and one last year -- were reported last week by the Food and Drug Administration. The other two deaths occurred in 2003. All were caused by sepsis, a bloodstream infection, health officials say. Sold as Mifeprex, and also known as...

FDA Issues Health Advisory for Mifepristone Citing Four Sepsis-Related Deaths Among Users; Drug Labeling To Be Updated 21 Jul 2005 FDA on Tuesday issued a... public health advisory warning physicians to watch for any signs of sepsis or other infection among women who have taken Danco Laboratories' Mifeprex -- known generically as mifepristone -- which when taken with misoprostol can cause a medical abortion, the AP/Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports. The agency is investigating four sepsis-related deaths among women who took the drug, including two cases reported to FDA in April and June (Neergaard, AP/Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 7/20). Physicians have identified the bacterium...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Five women who took the abortion pill RU-486 have died from bacterial infections since its U.S. introduction nearly five years ago, the manufacturer reported on Monday. "No causal relationship between these events" has been established with the drug, also known as Mifeprex or mifepristone, maker Danco Laboratories LLC said. "Childbirth, menstruation and abortion, whether spontaneous, surgical or medical, all create conditions that can result in serious and sometimes fatal infection, and there is no evidence that Mifeprex and misoprostol present a special risk of infection," the company said in a statement. Misoprostol is a drug that women...

Detroit, MI (LifeNews.com) -- Fifteen year-old Tamia Russell of Detroit died as a result of a second-trimester abortion earlier this year. It is suspected that the abortion drug RU-486 caused the fatal infection that claimed her life. Steven Brown of the Wayne County Medical Examiner's Office told LifeNews.com that the cause of death for Russell was listed as, "Uterine infarction with sepsis, due to status post second trimester abortion." Dr. Leigh Hlavaty, the medical examiner, listed the manner of death as "normal," as opposed to homicidal, suicidal, or accidental, due to the natural cause of death, the obstruction of her...