Abortion medication, HPV vaccine laws take effect Wednesday in three states

Kelcie Moseley-Morris, Stateline.org on Jul 1, 2026

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Several laws restricting access to medications that can be used to terminate a pregnancy and others placing limits on minors’ access to sexual and reproductive healthcare — including the HPV vaccine — take effect Wednesday, July 1, in Iowa, Mississippi and Tennessee.

Many bills were considered in state legislatures earlier this year that would have added legal restrictions to mifepristone and misoprostol, but only a few made it into law. The 13 states that have near-total abortion bans already have restrictions in place, but some have proposed more in the wake of new methods of obtaining the medications online or by telehealth.

A federal lawsuit is also ongoing that will determine whether the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s rules allowing mifepristone to be dispensed via telehealth will remain in place. That ruling will apply nationwide.

Kimya Forouzan, principal state policy adviser at the Guttmacher Institute, said the increased efforts to restrict access underscore the importance of shield laws in states that protect abortion access.

In Hawaii, provisions strengthening the state’s existing shield laws also take effect today. Those provisions include prohibiting the use or disclosure of patient health information to investigate someone who received reproductive or gender-affirming care and adding malpractice insurance and healthcare contract protections for providers in the state to prevent exorbitant rate increases, Forouzan said.

Iowa

Iowa’s new law requires medications including mifepristone and misoprostol to be dispensed in person, restricting access by telehealth. Mifepristone and misoprostol are typically used in combination to terminate a pregnancy in the first trimester or to treat miscarriages. Iowa has a six-week abortion ban, which is before many people know they are pregnant.

The law also made changes to abortion and pregnancy loss reporting, requiring a provider to report to the state whether a patient took mifepristone or misoprostol within 14 days of a pregnancy loss. It does not require the patient to tell the provider that information, nor does it compel the provider to ask, said Forouzan, but it might come up when a patient is asking questions or raising concerns.

“The reporting requirement is something that really has raised alarm bells for us because we know that mandatory state reporting of abortion has a potential to cause a lot of harm and increase the feelings of surveillance that patients experience,” Forouzan said.

Lawmakers also adopted a law prohibiting Iowans under age 18 from consenting to vaccinations related to sexually transmitted diseases and infections. Iowa Capital Dispatch reported that Republican lawmakers said the bill aligned with other state laws on vaccines — the HPV and hepatitis B vaccines were previously exempt. Science has shown the HPV vaccine prevents several strains of human papillomavirus that can be transmitted through sexual activity and potentially cause cervical and other cancers.

Mississippi

Mississippi passed a law in April adding mifepristone and misoprostol to the state’s drug trafficking law, making it a crime punishable by up to 10 years in prison to distribute or intend to distribute the drugs. It takes effect today.

Republican lawmakers in Mississippi have said the intent of the bill is to keep mifepristone and misoprostol from being sent to residents and undermining the state’s abortion ban, but providers say it creates more harm, especially for patients experiencing miscarriages.

Dr. Bhavik Kumar, a family medicine physician in Texas, told Stateline in March that the law causes confusion and prevents patients from seeking timely care and providers from administering care out of fear.

“Healthcare providers are suddenly having to think about laws and rules that have nothing to do with patient safety,” Kumar said.

Tennessee

Tennessee added new restrictions to medication abortion that allow the state attorney general to bring civil lawsuits and impose fines for violations of the state’s in-person dispensing requirements for medication abortion.

Tennessee has a near-total abortion ban, but some states have tried to enforce these laws against providers for prescribing medications to their residents, such as Louisiana, where the attorney general tried unsuccessfully to extradite a provider on charges.

The law allows for $10,000 fines per violation, up to $1 million.

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