Fourteen states prohibit medication abortion — a federally approved two-drug regimen that accounts for more than 50% of U.S. abortions — and 15 other states restrict abortion pills, according to NBC News.
The FDA approved medication abortion in 2000. In January 2023, the agency allowed eligible retail pharmacies to dispense mifepristone, the regimen's first drug that blocks progesterone, the hormone needed to support a pregnancy. CVS and Walgreens said they plan to begin filling mifepristone prescriptions in the next few weeks.
The pharmacy chains will begin selling in a handful of states where abortion pills are legal, spokespeople told Becker's.
Here are the states that ban medication abortion and the states that require a physician to prescribe the regimen rather than other clinicians, according to the Guttmacher Institute:
Banned:
Alabama
Arkansas
Idaho
Indiana
Kentucky
Louisiana
Mississippi
Missouri
North Dakota
Oklahoma
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
West Virginia
Physician-prescribed:
Alaska
Arizona (Patients must have an in-person physician visit, and mailing the pills is banned)
Florida
Georgia (The state has a six-week gestational limit for abortions)
Iowa
Kansas
Michigan
Nebraska (Patients must have an in-person physician visit)
Nevada
North Carolina (Patients must have an in-person physician visit, and mailing the pills is banned)
Ohio
Pennsylvania
South Carolina (Patients must have an in-person physician visit)
Utah
Wisconsin (Patients must have an in-person physician visit)
Clinician-prescribed:
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
District of Columbia
Hawaii
Illinois
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Minnesota
Montana
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
Oregon
Rhode Island
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
Wyoming