Report reveals network of black-market abortion pill drug cartels enabled by FDA and USPS

A Mexico-based network of black-market drug cartels is driving a growing wave of unrestricted, do-it-yourself (DIY) abortions in the United States, assisted by both a permissive Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and a lax U.S. Postal Service (USPS).

That finding is from a report released Wednesday by the pro-life American Life League (ALL), whose national director highlighted in a statement how pervasively women and girls throughout America are performing their own DIY abortions – even as many states have passed pro-life legislation since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. 

ALL’s Katie Brown said:

It’s clear that the FDA has dropped the ball on this. As the government agency charged with oversight of drugs coming into this country, they have failed. And where is the USPS? The post office is supposed to screen packages for illegal items, yet black market abortion drugs are being mailed into every state.

In “Beneath the Surface: Exposing the Abortion Pill Drug Cartel,” ALL details the workings of the Mexico-based Las Libres, an organization that self-describes as one that “promotes women’s human rights and universal access to abortion.” 

The group is one of multiple “community partner networks” that include abortion providers and abortion activists who serve as drug dealers trafficking the two abortion-inducing drugs mifepristone and misoprostol. The networks work illegally via the internet and USPS to send the drugs to customers – young girls and women who perform their own abortions at home and in college dorms without medical supervision.

“Abortion regulations have not and will not work to stop abortion pills from being sold,” ALL emphasized, noting as well that the pills come from unregulated and unvalidated suppliers, increasing the risk they may be “laced with other drugs and chemicals.”

“There is no way to verify this when abortion pills are being sent through a third-party distributor, from all over the world, and with little to no supervision,” the report noted:

This method allows traffickers and abusers to perpetuate their abuse, as they can, without the woman’s consent and knowledge and with few questions asked by the distributor, easily obtain these pills and give them to their victim to kill her baby, thus erasing her pregnancy.

On its home page, Las Libres showcases its one simple button: “Get Abortion Pills.”

The group instructs girls and women to visit the website of Plan C to learn how to secretly obtain abortion pills, even in states that have passed laws protecting the unborn from abortion.

“We recommend using a Proton Mail account for security (yours and ours),” the Plan C instructions say. “Open a free account here. Email [email protected] to request pills. In email subject line, write ‘Request for (your first name)’ … In email, include the first day of your last menstrual period. No other information is needed. You will receive instructions for how to order.”

Las Libres boasts in its FAQs that the abortion-inducing drugs “are safer than Tylenol for most people.”

“In fact, it’s safer to have an abortion than to carry a pregnancy to full term,” the group states, repeating a common false claim of abortion activists that pregnancy is “dangerous” to women.

“An abortion will not affect your future fertility and you will never have to tell anyone (even your health care providers) that you took them,” Las Libres claims, luring women with a positive spin.

Just several paragraphs later, however, the group admits to women and girls performing their own abortions – often alone – that “[p]elvic pain and cramping is likely to be your first symptom after taking the pills in Step 2.  It can be quite severe, keep you from your regular activities, and last for 24 to 48 hours.”

“It’s normal to have bleeding like or heavier than your period,” the group also points out. “You will pass blood clots and tissue, and it may continue for 24 hours or more.” 

After plugging the claim that DIY abortion is easy and safe, the pro-abortion activists then acknowledge the risk of ectopic pregnancy:

The abortion pills will not work if you have an ectopic pregnancy (pregnancy outside the uterus- usually in the fallopian tubes). Ectopic pregnancies are rare but if you now have an IUD, if you have a history of previous ectopic pregnancy or tubal surgery, you are at an increased risk of an ectopic pregnancy. Contact your support person if you have not had bleeding 24 hours after taking the abortion pills. An untreated ectopic pregnancy can have serious complications. 

While Las Libres suggests that girls and women experiencing medical complications from their DIY abortions – such as excessive bleeding – seek medical attention, the group also encourages them to lie to medical providers – apparently in order to protect both them and the members of the abortion activists’ groups themselves: 

Tell all intake and medical staff that you think you’re having a miscarriage.  Do not reveal that you took abortion medications—there is absolutely no way for them to know.  The pills will not show up in blood tests or scans. ER staff can provide the appropriate post-miscarriage medical care without knowing that you took pills. This also applies to interactions or consultation with your doctor or gynecologist: there is no need to tell them that your miscarriage was self-induced.

To be on the safe side, you should erase messages and emails about your abortion from your phone.

The pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute reported in March that 63% of all U.S. abortions were performed via pills alone in 2023. ALL observed as well that Planned Parenthood CEO Alexis McGill Johnson wrote in March that “nearly 70% of abortion patients at Planned Parenthood health centers choose medication abortion instead of in-clinic abortion.”

ALL’s Brown called this trend toward DIY abortion “disturbing.”

“These unsupervised procedures—self-administered without continuing medical oversight—are incredibly traumatic and dangerous to women,” she stated: 

Even legitimately distributed abortion pills come with an FDA boxed warning about potentially fatal infections. The Journal of Family Planning and Reproductive Health Care reports that many women who have taken these drugs report extreme stress and trauma caused by expelling their dead baby’s body at home, alone, after days of nausea, severe cramping, and bleeding. The FDA and USPS should care enough to intervene in this illegal importing of the dangerous DIY abortion drugs.

Read the full report by ALL here.

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