Saint Luke’s Health System in Kansas City, Mo., initially stopped providing Plan B at its locations in the state, which has outlawed most abortions, including those resulting from rape or incest.
Ella requires a prescription and can be taken within five days of unprotected sex, but it works better the sooner it is taken.ĭespite the fact that the morning-after pills do not terminate an existing pregnancy, clinics in some states may falsely interpret abortion restrictions as banning emergency contraceptives, too. It contains a drug called ulipristal acetate, and like Plan B, it works by preventing or delaying ovulation.
“Plan B is not able to induce an abortion,” wrote a spokesperson for Foundation Consumer Healthcare, the company that owns Plan B, in an e-mail to Scientific American.Īnother emergency contraceptive called Ella is effective in people who weigh up to about 195 pounds. It may not be effective for people heavier than about 155 to 165 pounds, however. It is available without a prescription and can be taken within 72 hours of sex (the sooner Plan B is taken, the more effective it is). There are several types of morning-after pills: Plan B, perhaps the most well-known, consists of the synthetic hormone levonorgestrel and works by preventing or delaying ovulation. “The key difference between emergency contraception and medication abortion is that emergency contraception prevents a pregnancy from occurring, while medication abortion ends a pregnancy,” says Jen Villavicencio, lead for equity transformation at the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. Importantly, emergency contraception cannot terminate a pregnancy, which the medical community defines as a fertilized egg that has implanted in the uterus. If ovulation has already occurred, it has been hypothesized that the morning-after pill may prevent the egg from being fertilized or implanting in the uterus, although some studies suggest it does not affect these processes. This kind of drug works primarily by preventing or delaying ovulation, or the release of an egg from an ovary. In contrast, emergency contraception-sometimes called the “morning-after pill”-can be taken up to three to five days after unprotected sex or failed birth control. Misoprostol can be taken on its own to induce an abortion but is more effective when taken with mifepristone. It causes the uterus to contract and the cervix to soften, allowing the uterus to empty. Misoprostol (Cytotec), a synthetic form of a prostaglandin, a group of compounds with hormonelike effects, is taken within a day or two after mifepristone. It blocks receptors for the hormone progesterone, causing the embryo to detach from the uterine wall and the uterus’s lining to break down, ending the pregnancy. Mifepristone (Mifeprex), also known as RU-486, is taken within 10 weeks of a pregnant person’s last period. They work together by causing something like a heavy menstrual period. Approved by the Food and Drug Administration, this protocol includes the drugs mifepristone and misoprostol. usually consists of a combination of two drugs, both taken orally after consultation with a medical provider.
Wade, the nearly 50-year-old legal precedent that guaranteed a constitutional right to an abortion, has people scrambling for access to medications that can end a pregnancy or prevent one.īut there is already confusion over the difference between drugs for medication abortion, which are prescribed to end a pregnancy, and emergency contraceptives (including Plan B), which are taken soon after sex and prevent pregnancy. The recent Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v.
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