Thanks to you at home for joining me this hour. In 1993, Time magazine called it the

pill that changes everything. The new abortion pill called R.U 46 was part of a

two drug protocol for medication abortion and it really changed

the American health care landscape and the landscape across the globe.

Pregnant people in China, the United Kingdom, Sweden, France, where the drug had already been approved,

had the ability to end pregnancies without undergoing surgery,

and even in some cases from inside the four walls of their own homes.

According to time, RU486 made abortion a truly personal and private choice.

But it also opened up a whole new frontier of anti-abortion backlash.

As soon as the drug was first developed and approved in France in the 1980s, it sparked protests.

Facing intense pressure from the Catholic Church,

the company behind the pill decided to temporarily just

pull it from the market.

In the US, the pill was considered a banned substance.

Federal research was forbidden during the Reagan and Bush years.

Finally, in September of 2000,

after four years and three rounds of FDA reviews during the Clinton administration,

RU-486 was approved in the US.

But the war had just begun.

In other news this morning, abortion opponents say they're outraged over the government's decision

Thursday approving the use of the abortion pill RU-486 in this country.

Abortion rights supporters call it a victory over medical McCarthyism.

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