WASHINGTON, D.C. — This week, Liberty Counsel Action (LCA) submitted written testimony to the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor & Pensions (HELP) exposing the dangers chemical abortion drugs pose to women and the environment.

The HELP Committee held a hearing on Capitol Hill January 14 titled, “Protecting Women: Exposing the Dangers of Chemical Abortion Drugs.” According to committee chairman Sen. Bill Cassidy, the hearing’s goal was to “prioritize women’s safety over political ideology” amid the deregulation of abortion pills by past administrations and current federal inaction to restore those safety regulations. The committee heard live testimony from Louisiana Attorney General Elizabeth Murrill and board-certified OB-GYN Dr. Monique Chireau Wubbenhorst advocating for stronger regulatory safeguards for chemical abortion drugs. Respectively, they testified regarding how mail-order abortion pills sent illegally across state lines undermine state pro-life laws and violate the federal Comstock Act, and carry significant short and long-term health risks for women.

At the hearing, Sen. Cassidy requested unanimous consent to enter LCA’s written testimony into the Congressional Record, which was granted.

LCA asserts that the chemical abortion drugs Mifepristone and Misoprostol pose serious physical, mental, emotional, and environmental risks to women and society. The testimony calls for reinstating FDA safety protocols and conducting a comprehensive, legally compliant environmental assessment arguing that current oversights allow abortion drug contaminants and aborted human fetal remains into the nation’s water supply. These oversights violate federal laws like the Clean Water Act (CWA) and the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). 

“Unknowingly, numerous women take these abortion pills only to be traumatized by extreme pain and witnessing their fully formed baby floating in a toilet,” reads the testimony. “The regret and trauma these pills induce cannot be overstated, and the ease with which women obtain them is bordering criminal.”

“Yet: this is the goal of the abortion industry, to make abortion as easy and profitable as possible,” wrote LCA.

The adverse effects of chemical abortion drugs also extend far beyond the women who ingest them, noted the testimony.

“According to the CWA, Mifepristone and its active metabolites would qualify as pollutants (‘chemical wastes’) that are discharged into wastewater systems and likely to enter our drinking water supply, given conventional wastewater treatment plants do not fully remove these types of contaminants,” wrote LCA. “Under the CWA, fetal remains generated from chemical abortions also qualify as pollutants (‘biological materials’) that may be discharged into our water systems, threatening environmental safety given aborted fetal remains do not break down like feces or toilet paper and can therefore lead to clogs, as well as contribute to sewer system overflows.”

LCA noted that when federal actions may pollute the environment, such as the FDA’s deregulation of chemical abortion drugs, a detailed environmental analysis is required. However, for the last 25 years, the FDA allegedly failed to comply with these environmental laws when approving or modifying the safety protocols for Mifepristone and its generic brands. 

While U.S. environmental studies of Mifepristone are sparse, the drug is known to act as an “endocrine disruptor” by blocking the vital fertility hormone progesterone, LCA wrote citing several studies. The drug’s metabolites remain active after both excretion and entrance into the water supply with the ability to potentially disrupt natural bodily processes in both humans and wildlife, the testimony noted.

With the rise in abortion pill usage—now accounting for nearly 70 percent of more than one million abortions every year nationwide, LCA notes there has also been a rise in national infertility rates. Considering that potentially hundreds of thousands of abortions are taking place at home leading to abortion drug contaminants and human remains being flushed into the water supply, LCA asks the question: “Are American men and women drinking trace amounts of a chemical substance that blocks a vital fertility hormone?”

To answer that question, LCA recommends that Congress “immediately solicit independent, gold-standard scientific study” to determine the prevalence of Mifepristone and its metabolites in our nation’s water sources and whether it adversely affects animal or human health and fertility. 

LCA also recommends the FDA reinstate the original safety protocols for all chemical abortion drugs and consider pulling Mifepristone and its generics off the market while this research is conducted.

Liberty Counsel Action Chairman Mat Staver said, “We know chemical abortion drugs kill an innocent human being. There is compelling evidence they also harm women physically and emotionally, and harm the environment by contaminating our water supply. Objective, gold-standard research is needed, and until such research is complete, we strongly urge the abortion pill be pulled from the market.”

Learn more at abortioninourwater.org.

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