abortion

Black Catholics confront a moral dilemma in the upcoming presidential election: vote with their church or vote with the party that they have long preferred to keep the first African-American president in office four more years. While African-American Catholics are relatively few in number, they may represent enough of the black vote to make a difference in the outcome if they choose to bestow or withhold their support.

Misoprostol, which requires a prescription in the United States, is used primarily for ulcer prevention here and is not prescribed, on its own, for abortions. American doctors and clinics do sometimes pair it with the drug mifepristone (formerly known as RU-486) to produce a “medical abortion,” a method considered more effective than using misoprostol by itself. But the World Health Organization has said that using misoprostol alone can be highly effective as an abortion method.