Lewis asked: hello welcome your health fast, Scientific American Podcast series!
Josh Fishman: This show focuses on the latest important health news and discoveries that affect your body and mind.
Each episode dives into one topic. Discuss diseases, treatments, and some controversies.
Lewis: It also demystifies medical research in ways you can use to stay healthy.
My name is Tanya Lewis.
Fishman: My name is Josh Fishman.
Lewis: it was Scientific AmericanSenior Health Editor of .
Fishman: Today’s show talks about obscure 19th-century obscenity laws. That prompted a recent court ruling seeking to restrict access to the abortion drug mifepristone.
[Clip: Show theme music]
Lewis: April was a busy month in the fight to roll back reproductive rights.
First, a Texas district court judge ruled to remove the abortion drug mifepristone from the market. It is used for more than half of abortions in the United States and is also used to treat miscarriage. The Supreme Court has so far stayed the verdict.
[Clip: ABC 7 Chicago news report]
reporter: Mifepristone, known as abortion drug, gets temporary lifeline from US Supreme Court. Judges need more time to consider whether the drug should remain widely available or whether restrictions placed on mifepristone when it was approved more than 20 years ago should be rescinded. is.
In a district court case, Trump-appointed Judge Matthew Kaksmalik ruled in favor of anti-abortion activists and doctors who said they weren’t safe when the Food and Drug Administration approved the drug more than 20 years ago. He argued that he did not adequately address the risks of
fishman: But isn’t it? I have seen dozens of studies on the safety of the pill.
Lewis: Right – A wealth of research shows it is very safe and effective.Studies show that over 99% of patients taking abortion pills have no serious complications. I’m here.
Fishman: Just hours after the Texas ruling, Barack Obama-appointed Washington District Judge Thomas Rice issued a competing ruling.
One ordered the FDA to do nothing to restrict access to mifepristone, which is now legal for abortion.This includes 17 states and Washington DC
Lewis: The Department of Justice and Danco Laboratories, the company that manufactures mifepristone, have appealed Texas’ decision to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.
That court reserved judgment until the case was fully heard, but imposed certain restrictions on drugs in force before 2016.
fishman: What restrictions?
Lewis: It’s like banning people from mailing in mifepristone, but more on that later.
The Supreme Court has suspended both Texas and Fifth Circuit rulings, restoring full access to mifepristone, and the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals will proceed with a hearing later this month. And that’s how it is now.
Fishman: I’m having a hard time following all this legal logic. What was the original Texas ruling based on? We’ve already discussed mifepristone’s excellent safety record, but medical abortion has been legal for decades.
Lewis: that’s a great question. A plaintiff in a Texas lawsuit argued that mifepristone (part of his two-drug regimen in combination with the drug misoprostol) can cause serious complications in people who take it. .
However, dozens of studies have shown that the combination has fewer side effects than many other FDA-approved drugs, such as Tylenol and Viagra.
Fishman: interesting Doctors in Texas were more interested in Mifepristone than Viagra. What about the Fifth Circuit ruling against mailing mifepristone? Where did it come from?
Lewis: thank you. Both the Fifth Circuit decision and the original Texas decision cite an 1873 law called the Comstock Act, which prohibits the mailing of “obscene, obscene, obscene” material.
Annalee Newitz: It is named after Anthony Comstock, a very famous moral crusader based in New York in the mid-19th century. His career began largely because he was interested in rooting out obscenity.
Lewis: My name is Annaleigh Newitz, author and science journalist. They wrote her science fiction novel called “The Future of Another Timeline.” This is about a group of feminists going back in time to stop Comstock’s misogynistic anti-obscenity crusade.
In a recent article on Sciam.com, I spoke with Newitz about Comstock and how his laws are still used to limit reproductive rights.
Newits: It just prohibits you from emailing obscene material… Of course he was targeting very specific people, people known to sell raw materials, but more importantly The thing is, people were selling all sorts of information about sex education. It’s not obscene, it’s literally like “here’s how to make a baby” for people getting married, and information about birth control and abortion.
Lewis: The law was based on the First Amendment exception for obscenity not protected as free speech.
Keep in mind, of course, that the definition of obscenity at the time was rather vague. It included anything related to reproductive health, abortion, and sex education.
Congress actually created a new office for Comstock as a special agent for the United States Postal Service. It had the power to arrest people for obscenity.
Newits: He also had an army of deputy oppressors of sorts. The organization is called the New York Society for Corruption Suppression, and it sounds like something out of Marvel Comics. They figured out who the abortion provider was and broke in.
Lewis: and Comstock and his agents were pretty brutal.
Newits: They found out that the person was in the process of having an abortion, broke into the house during the abortion, dragged him bleeding to the police station, and left him on the floor to claim.
Fishman: did they really do that? It’s just terrifying. And dangerous! Patient may die.
Lewis: absolutely. It was pretty barbaric.
Comstock also pursued art and literature that he deemed obscene.
Newits: Comstock tried to close down the Chicago World’s Fair. Because they put belly dancing as one of many acts you can go see and thought belly dancing was obscene.
Lewis: In 1905, playwright George Bernard Shaw new york times Making fun of America’s “Comstockery” – a term he used to refer to censorship attitudes towards art and literature.
Fishman: Shaw was actually fighting back at public libraries that put his play on a restricted reading list. “Comstockery is his joke the world’s standing,” he writes. “If I had the misfortune of being an American citizen, perhaps my property would have been confiscated by some postman and I myself would have been imprisoned.”
Comstockery is a great term. Start using.
Lewis: i know right? But even though Comstock himself became a sort of joke, this law and similar laws enacted by states remained on the books.
In the 1960s and 70s, the Supreme Court made several important decisions limiting the definition of obscenity.As Justice Potter Stewart famously said in the 1964 case, Jacobellis vs Ohiowhen asked to define obscenity…
[Clip: Justice Potter Stewart]
stewart: You can see it.
Lewis: And in 1973 you Law vs WadeHe basically stated that abortion was legal because of the constitutional right to privacy, not because abortion itself was protected.
Newits: Almost every attorney I hear talking about this… anyone familiar with reproductive rights is saying, “Why did we do that?” It was a very shaky ruling that could easily be reversed.
Fishman: And that’s exactly what happened Dobbs The decision was made last summer.it flipped Law vs Wadepaves the way for many states to ban or severely restrict abortion.
Lewis: that’s right. And all that time, it never really repealed the Comstock Act’s provision for mailing abortion pills. As such, the Texas Mifepristone ruling and the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals used the law as a justification for attempts to limit the distribution of abortion pills.
Fishman: So what happens next?
Lewis: The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has scheduled a hearing on May 17.
But the case will almost certainly end up in the Supreme Court, where judges will once again have to wrestle with Comstock’s legacy.
Fishman: Well, we’ll see if Comstockery can hold up in the 21st century.
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fishman: Your Health Quickly is written and edited by Tulika Bose, Jeff DelViscio, Kelso Harper, and Elah Feder. Our music was composed by Dominic Smith.
Lewis: Our show is part of Scientific American’s podcast, Science, Quickly. You can subscribe anywhere you can get a podcast. If you like the show, please rate or review it.
fishman: And don’t forget to visit Sciam.com for updated and in-depth health news.
Lewis: Tanya Lewis.
Fishman: My name is Josh Fishman.
Lewis: I will be back in 2 weeks. Thank you for listening!
