When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, people rushed to stockpile toilet paper, hand sanitizer and other goods. When the infant formula shortage happened, many parents hoarded what was left of baby formula in their local supermarkets. It shouldn't come as a surprise that in the wake of Roe v. Wade being overturned, many women in abortion ban states stockpiled on abortion pills.
In a research letter published in JAMA Internal Medicine, researchers looked at the data on requests for mifepristone and misoprostol from people who weren’t pregnant, but still seeking abortion pills from an online telemedicine service called Aid Access located in Europe. In the U.S., a medication abortion is usually prescribed when a woman is pregnant. However, the idea of a so-called “advance provision,” which is akin to keeping Tylenol around for a fever but instead keeping abortion pills nearby for pregnancy, has been discussed as a potential abortion care model in a post-Roe world.
