Biased CNS Article Touts Right-Wing Lawsuit Against Abortion Drug

Peyton Holliday wrote in a Nov. 22 CNSNews.com article:

The Alliance Defending Freedom has filed a lawsuit against the U. S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), arguing that the agency failed to abide by its legal obligations “to protect the health, safety, and welfare of women and girls” when it authorized the use of chemical abortion drugs in the U.S. and “eliminated necessary safeguards for pregnant women and girls who undergo this dangerous drug regimen.”

The chemical abortion drugs specifically are mifepristone and misoprostol. According to doctors, they usually must be taken prior to the 11th week of pregnancy to ensure an abortion. Mifepristone is taken first and then, 24 hours later, 4 misoprostol pills are taken. Several hours later cramping and bleeding starts and the tiny baby is expelled from the uterus.  

Currently, these abortion drugs can be delivered through the mail – as ordered by the Biden administration during the COVID pandemic – but this is a violation of federal law, according to the plaintiffs, who also charge that the FDA “never had the authority to approve these drugs for sale” in the first place.

The lawsuit was filed Nov. 18 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, Amarillo Division. The Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the American College of Pediatricians and several other doctors are suing the FDA commissioner, other FDA officials, and Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra.

The Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine is a nonprofit membership organization that represents nearly 30,000 health-care professionals. The Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) represents the plaintiffs.

Missing from all of this is explicit labeling of the right-wing anti-abortion bias of all these groups. Contrary to Holliday’s benign description of the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, it is in fact an anti-abortion group that attacks the procedure as “the intentional destruction of human life through barbaric methods.” The American College of Pediatricians is also a right-wing group that is not only anti-abortion but also deeply homophobic.

Holliday also gave voice to another anti-abortion group that she failed to label a such attacking the drug’s safety:

Commenting on the case, SBA Pro-Life America President Marjorie Dannenfelser said, “First authorized in 2000 and expanded via mail-order under the pro-abortion Biden administration, abortion pills are swiftly becoming a leading health risk to mothers and babies. The FDA’s reckless lack of meaningful oversight has led to serious complications and a surge in emergency room visits for women using this drug regimen.” “Pregnancy is not an ‘illness’ as the FDA described in their creative justification to broadly distribute this dangerous pill.”

SBA Pro-Life America further said in a statement, “Multiple peer-reviewed studies confirm that women are at risk of severe side effects after taking chemical abortion pills, including hemorrhaging, the need for follow-up surgery, and even death. New Lozier Institute peer-reviewed research has found women are also twice as likely to be admitted for surgery if their abortion pill-related complications are miscoded by emergency room personnel as a natural miscarriage.”

Holliday gave no space to anyone to argue for the safety of the drugs. As Wonkette summarized:

The fact is, Mifepristone is extremely safe. It is safer than Tylenol, it is safer than Viagra, it is safer than penicillin. It is safer than a lot of drugs that have historically been prescribed or sold over the counter. It is, in fact, far safer than being pregnant. Since 2000, 26 patients have died from complications related to Mifepristone, while 700 have died from pregnancy … per year.

Of Holliday’s 14-paragraph article, only two were given to non-right-wing activists — not to get an actual comment about the lawsuit, mind you, but for a simple (and lazy) copy-and-paste:

Planned Parenthood praises the use of chemical abortion drugs. “Medication abortion is extremely effective in ending an early pregnancy, working approximately 95-99% of the time, and gives patients the option to end their pregnancy at home or in another setting in which they feel comfortable, while still providing them with the medical support and information they need,” said Planned Parenthood on its website.  

“A growing number of patients in the United States are choosing to end their pregnancy with medication abortion,” said the nation’s largest abortion provider.  “In fact, in 2014, nearly one in three people seeking abortion outside of a hospital used medication abortion.”

Like other CNS interns before her, Holliday appears to have spent her time there being taught to spread partisan talking points, not how to practice journalism.