New NY law lets doctors keep their names off abortion meds

A bill Gov. Kathy Hochul signed Monday aims to make it harder for authorities in other states to prosecute New York doctors who prescribe abortion medication online.

The new law allows doctors to keep their names off of prescription labels for mifepristone and misoprostol, drugs commonly used to terminate early pregnancies. Instead, they’ll be allowed to list their practices or — once lawmakers approve an agreed-upon tweak in the coming days — the addresses of the practices instead, according to Hochul’s approval message.

Hochul approved the legislation three days after a Louisiana grand jury hit Dr. Margaret Carpenter, a doctor from the Hudson Valley town of New Paltz, with a criminal abortion charge alleging she prescribed abortion medication to a resident of the state. Abortions are banned in Louisiana, with limited exceptions.

“You know how they found this doctor? The doctor's name was on the prescription bottle,” Hochul said at a bill-signing event at the state Capitol. “That's what they were looking for to identify this individual. After today, that will no longer happen.”

But some of the bill’s supporters question whether it would do much to shield doctors who work for small practices with single addresses, such as Carpenter.

Assemblymember Amy Paulin, a Democrat from Westchester County, said the bill Hochul signed is “a great step.” But she said doctors from single practices or those who practice telehealth from their homes won’t be afforded the same anonymity as those who work for larger practices.

“There are many, many doctors who are in single practices, including Dr. Carpenter, who as a result wouldn't be fully protected under this bill,” Paulin said shortly after Hochul signed it into law.

Paulin sponsors a bill that would allow the state health commissioner to issue a non-patient-specific prescription for the two abortion medications, effectively making them available over the counter. Those prescriptions could then be mailed out of state without a doctor’s name or practice attached.

The bill Hochul signed Monday builds on the state’s 2022 “shield laws,” which prohibit local officials from assisting with out-of-state investigations into New York abortion providers in most cases while prohibiting the governor from cooperating with extradition demands.

Carpenter, meanwhile, is the co-founder of a group that fights for doctors’ right to prescribe abortion pills through telehealth services.

At the bill-signing event Monday, Hochul said Carpenter “simply responded to a cry for help” and shouldn’t face the possibility of prison time and steep fines.

“There’s no way in hell that I’ll ever respond to a request to extradite this individual and face criminal charges,” she said. “Never, under any circumstances, will I sign an extradition agreement that sends our doctor into harm’s way to be prosecuted as a criminal for simply following her oath.”

On X, Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill condemned Hochul’s comments. Louisiana authorities claim the mother of the teenager who was prescribed the abortion medication coerced the young girl to take it.

“Cheerleading for the alleged coerced abortion of a young girl is sick and barbaric,” Murrill wrote. “It’s not ‘reproductive health care,’ it’s force.”

Hochul said the claims of coercion are “irrelevant” to her obligation to protect the doctor who prescribed the medication to the person who requested it.

“First of all, I'm not sure it's true,” Hochul said about the claims. “No. 2, I'm not sure that that's not just a Republican distraction from what they're trying to do.”

The bill Hochul signed into law took effect immediately on Monday.