Progressives routinely advance their agenda by obscuring the suffering of women and children. Every cultural revolution they champion, from redefining marriage to dismantling biological sex to flooding the country with abortion pills, demands one thing: suppression of consequences.

During the gay marriage debate, we were told it was all about adult love and equality. In reality, children paid the price.

This is the progressive playbook: Minimize harm, deny casualties, and move the Overton window.

With the transgender surge, Americans were assured it was just about “letting people pee in peace.” In reality, it meant lost female swim and track records, male rapists in women’s prisons, and irreversible surgeries on minors.

And now it's the abortion pill. Sold as “a safe, effective, FDA-approved method for people to end a pregnancy in the comfort of their own homes,” it has quietly become one of the most dangerous medical products routinely given to American women — no doctor visit required.

A groundbreaking new study by the Ethics and Public Policy Center shatters the illusion of safety around mifepristone, the abortion drug created by Danco Laboratories and greenlighted by the FDA. Based on real-world insurance claims (versus the previous shallow clinical trials) the data shows that one in 10women who take the abortion pill suffer a serious or life-threatening complication: sepsis, hemorrhaging, emergency surgery, hospitalization — even death.

“Simply stated,” the report says, “mifepristone, as used in real-world conditions, is not ‘safe and effective.’”

Naming the victims

The study analyzed a staggering 865,727 chemical abortions between 2017 and 2023, drawn from an all-payer insurance claims database covering private insurers, Medicaid, Medicare, Tricare, and the Department of Veterans Affairs. Unlike the cherry-picked participants in controlled trials, these women represent the actual population using mifepristone today.

The EPPC found that 10.93% of women experienced serious adverse events within 45 days of their abortions — a rate 22 times higher than what the FDA reports on its drug label, which still cites outdated trials from as far back as 1983. As the authors note, those clinical trials enrolled just 30,966 people and were conducted under tightly controlled conditions. The real world doesn’t work that way.

And the real world has already buried the dead.

Amber Nicole Thurman, a 28-year-old medical assistant and mother from Georgia, died on August 19, 2022, from septic shock after experiencing complications from a medication abortion. After taking abortion pills, she developed a severe infection due to retained fetal tissue.

In 2017, 23-year-old Keisha Atkins underwent a late-term abortion in New Mexico, using mifepristone and misoprostol. She developed sepsis and required transfer to the University of New Mexico Hospital. Her condition rapidly worsened, and she died during emergency surgery.

Atkins and Thurman are not rare exceptions. Candi Miller, a 41-year-old mother, and Porsha Ngumezi, 35, also suffered fatal complications. Other unnamed victims fill the record. These women represent just a fraction of the tens of thousands who faced serious complications after taking mifepristone.

The EPPC report confirms what these stories reveal: The FDA has abandoned its responsibility to women in pursuit of politically pressured expediency.

In the name of “access,” the FDA has dismantled the original safeguards it once demanded when approving mifepristone in 2000.

Back then, patients were required to make three in-person visits. Only physicians could prescribe the drug. Pills had to be administered in a clinic or hospital setting. Providers had to be able to diagnose ectopic pregnancies and provide emergency surgical care if needed. Adverse events had to be reported.

Now? One telehealth call. Pills mailed to your house. And no obligation to report complications — unless the woman dies.

Returning to reality

In light of such overwhelming evidence of harm, the EPPC report recommends that “the FDA immediately reinstate its earlier, stronger patient safety protocols to ensure physician responsibility for women who take mifepristone under their care, as well as mandate full reporting of its side effects.”

The EPPC is right. Because the data is damning.

The study used the FDA’s own criteria to identify serious adverse events: infections, transfusions, ER visits, repeat surgeries, and psychiatric emergencies, all coded through ICD-10 and CPT medical billing systems. And while the report was cautious — tracking events within 45 days instead of the 72-day window used by FDA trial data — the outcome was still catastrophic.

“We included CTCAE Grade 3 (severe) and Grade 4 (life-threatening),” the report notes. “We did not include Grade 1 (mild) or Grade 2 (moderate).”

In other words, these weren’t headaches or stomach cramps. These were emergencies. And the women were often alone.

Chemical abortions now account for roughly two-thirds of all abortions in America. That means mifepristone is not a niche product — it’s mainstream. And yet the public has been systematically lied to about the risks, even as the federal government continues to loosen restrictions.

This is the progressive playbook: Minimize harm, deny casualties, and move the Overton window. It worked with marriage. It worked with gender. It’s working with abortion pills — unless we stop pretending.

Justice requires living in reality. And the reality is that women and children are the consistent casualties of the progressive utopia.

We owe women more than euphemisms about “empowerment.” We owe them truth, compassion, accountability — and, in this case, stricter regulations that once existed for their protection.

The EPPC’s report is only the beginning. As more real-world data emerges, the FDA and drug manufacturers will be forced to answer the one question they’ve dodged for decades: How many women must suffer and die before “safe and effective” actually means something again?