BOSTON, Jan. 4, 01 (CWNews.com) - Two doctors, in an article in Thursday's edition of the New England Journal of Medicine, have criticized the maker of a drug which is often used to induce abortion for warning doctors against using it for that purpose.

    The two members of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists said pharmaceutical company G.D. Searle should not have sent a letter to doctors in 2000 warning that misoprostol had only been approved for use to treat ulcers. Doctors Ralph Hale and Stanley Zinberg said Searle's letter misrepresents the law, which allows doctors to prescribe FDA-approved drugs for unapproved uses.

    Misoprostol is used along with the abortion drug RU-486 to expel the body of the dead unborn child from his mother. Hale and Zinberg said in the editorial that because of Searle's letter some hospitals had refused to allow misoprostol to be used for abortions.

    Searle issued the letter just a month before the FDA in September approved the use of RU-486 for some abortions. The FDA also specifically recommended the use of misoprostol as part of the RU-486 treatment.

For other news stories, see

January 5, 2001
volume 12, no. 5
News on the Church in the USA

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