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For the first time, retail pharmacies, from corner drugstores to major chains like CVS and Walgreens, will be allowed to offer abortion pills in the United States under a regulatory change made Tuesday by the Food and Drug Administration. The action could significantly expand access to abortion through medication. (Belluck, 1/3)

Medication abortion accounts for over half of abortions in the country. Abortion pills are frequently prescribed online and mailed to patients, effectively providing a way to circumvent state restrictions that took effect after the high court decision — even as 18 states require that a patient take the pills in person. (Gonzalez, 1/4)

CEO Evan Masingill of GenBioPro, the generic maker of the medication, called the FDA’s move “a step in the right direction that is especially needed to increase access to abortion care.” ... He added, however, that the policy “will not provide equal access to all people” because many states have laws in place either banning abortion in most circumstances or mandating that patients only get the pills directly from their prescribing doctors. (Miranda Ollstein and Gardner, 1/3)

The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) can continue to deliver prescription abortion medication despite a June 2022 Supreme Court ruling that overturned a landmark abortion rights decision, the Justice Department said on Tuesday. The department's Office of Legal Counsel said in an opinion sought by USPS that the mailing of mifepristone and misoprostol, commonly used to terminate pregnancies, did not violate an 1873 law known as the Comstock Act. (Shepardson, 1/4)

A legal opinion, from Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel, concludes that a nearly 150-year-old statute aimed at fighting “vice” through the mail is not enforceable against mailings of abortion drugs as long as the sender does not know that the drugs will be used illegally. (Gerstein and Ollstein, 1/3)