Colorado is one-third of the way to becoming the first state to ban “abortion reversal,” as its medical board recently ruled the scientifically unfounded treatment does not meet generally accepted standards of medical practice.
Now, the state boards of nursing and pharmacy must weigh in, fulfilling a requirement laid out in April when Gov. Jared Polis approved Senate Bill 23-190, Deceptive Trade Practice Pregnancy-related Service.
Progressive advocacy groups Colorado Organization for Latina Opportunity and Reproductive Rights (COLOR) and New Era Colorado helped craft the legislation. Katherine Riley, policy director with COLOR, says there’s little concern the other two boards will come to a different conclusion as the bill directs all three entities to conclude “in consultation with each other.” The nursing and pharmacy boards are set to meet on Sept. 20 and 21, respectively.
“We gave them a mandate that by Oct. 1 all three of the boards must meet, hear comment, hear testimony, look at all the available data and research, and then promulgate rules on whether or not [abortion reversal] meets the standards of medical practice,” Riley says. “If they find that it doesn’t, then the bill stands.”
SB 190 deems abortion reversal “unprofessional conduct” that could result in “discipline” for those who provide it, namely “crisis pregnancy centers” that masquerade as full reproductive health facilities but only offer anti-abortion counseling. The “reversal” treatment — often mischaracterized in the media as a pill, though it can be administered as an intramuscular injection — is given to people who are undergoing medical abortions, which require two medications: mifepristone, to stop pregnancy growth by blocking the hormone progesterone, and misoprostol, which makes the uterus contract. Reversal purports to use high doses of progesterone to reverse the effects of mifepristone before — and only before — misoprostol is taken.
“That’s not actually true,” Riley says, “because when you block the [progesterone] receptors, they’re blocked.” According to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, “medication abortion is more effective when both drugs are used, because mifepristone alone will not always cause abortion.”
But doubts around abortion are rare: A groundbreaking, decade-long research study found that 95% of people do not regret their choice to have an abortion.
There are three crisis pregnancy centers in Boulder County, according to crisispregnancycentermap.com.
