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Just Pills

The Extraordinary Story of a Revolution in Abortion Care

Author: Rebecca Kelliher

As women’s rights are increasingly depleted in the US, journalist Rebecca Kelliher dives into the radical history of the abortion pills from invention to distribution to today

Spanning decades and continents with a tenacious cast of doctors, activists, politicians, drug suppliers, and everyday women, Just Pills tells the gripping, little-known history of mifepristone and misoprostol, better known as the abortion pills.

The abortion pills are a safe, cheap, clinic-less means of ending a pregnancy, and these drugs have been quietly—yet steadily—spreading around the world. These pills are already changing the fight for abortion access as we understand it. Rebecca Kelliher dives into the history of the pills’ invention in the 1970s and 80s, unpacks government battles around their approval in the 1990s, and deftly weaves together several perspectives to move beyond the pills’ origin story.

As women’s rights are increasingly infringed upon in the US, this history of radical invention and persistent distribution of a life-saving drug will remind us of the work we’ve already done and inspire us to continue to pursue a world where women are free.