Pro-life and pro-choice advocates reacted to the death of the “father of the abortion pill,” Étienne-Émile Baulieu, who died Friday at the age of 98 at his home in Paris.
The French biochemist specialized in hormone research, The New York Times reported Saturday, but his work in the early 1980s in developing RU-486, or mifepristone, brought him into the public eye. Baulieu developed the drug in partnership with the French pharmaceutical company Roussel-Uclaf, where he served as an independent consultant.
Baulieu seemed to think that the abortion drug would prevent women from dying from botched abortions, telling the journal Science in 1989, “RU-486 can save them.” The scientist pushed for the pill’s approval, both in France and abroad, according to the Times.
Over the years, pro-life advocates have raised concerns about abortion drugs ending the lives of unborn children and negatively impacting the health of pregnant women. Pro-life doctors have also spoken against the distribution of abortion drugs via mail, noting that a medical professional might not have had the chance to screen the pregnant woman for complications like an ectopic pregnancy.
When asked about opposition to the abortion pill by The New Yorker in 2022, Baulieu replied, “Ideology and machismo, alas, weigh more heavily than rationality and scientific proof.”
“A method that makes the termination of pregnancy less physically traumatic for women and less risky to their health has always been rejected by pro-lifers: what they really seek is to harm and punish women,” he said.
Here are seven reactions from pro-life and pro-choice advocates to the death of the “father of the abortion pill.”
Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America
Emily Davis, the vice president of communications at the nonprofit Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, commented on Étienne-Émile Baulieu's passing, saying that the French scientist “leaves behind a legacy of death and deception.”
“His creation of the abortion drug opened the floodgates to today’s abortion industry, where groups like Planned Parenthood now push dangerous abortion drugs through apps and the mail,” Davis told The Christian Post.
“Women and girls are misled into thinking these drugs are as ‘safe as Tylenol,’ despite a growing body of research exposing this lie,” she added. “His passing is a reminder of the urgent need to defund these abortion machines and stand for truth, life and real care for women and children."
The Charlotte Lozier Institute, SBA Pro-Life America’s research arm, published a report in May in the journal BioTech that challenged the claim that abortion drugs are safer than Tylenol.
"It is essential to state unequivocally that there has never been a single study appropriately comparing the safety of mifepristone and [Tylenol] or any of the common drugs presented in these claims, let alone a 20-year history of 'clear and conclusive scientific evidence' to this end," CLI Director of Life Sciences Carmen Louti stated in the report.
Loutit argues that "using death counts or death rates from different studies, at different times, and in vastly different populations, they asserted a reductionist definition of safety and compared numbers that are entirely incomparable."
Simone Harari Baulieu
Étienne-Émile Baulieu’s wife, Simone Harari Baulieu, confirmed the news of her husband’s death in a Friday social media post that linked to a Baulieu Institute article detailing the life of the abortion pill inventor. The French scientist founded the institute in 2008 to understand neurodegenerative diseases.
“It is with deep sadness that I announce the death of Professor Étienne-Émile Baulieu this Friday, May 30, 2025,” the wife of the French biochemist and physician wrote. “A life of commitment to science.”
National Right to Life
Randall K. O'Bannon, director of education and research at National Right to Life, reflected on Étienne-Émile Baulieu’s legacy in a Friday statement on the pro-life group’s website.
“Obviously a brilliant mind,” O'Bannon commented. “What a shame to see that mind so consumed by what he saw as the world’s ‘demographic problem’ (too many of the “wrong’ sort of people) that he used his intellectual gifts, not to save lives, but to develop new ways to kill innocent, defenseless children and put the lives and health of so many of their mothers at risk.”
Emmanuel Macron
French President Emmanuel Macron reacted to the news of Baulieu’s death in a Friday X post, stating, “We have lost a courageous scout.”
“Few French people have changed the world to such an extent. Resistance fighter, research genius, defender of contraception, inventor of an abortion pill, Étienne-Emile Baulieu was a progressive spirit who enabled women to achieve their freedom,” Macron wrote.
Agence France-Press in Paris reported that the French president presented the father of the abortion pill the Grand-Croix de la Legion d’Honneur in 2023, the country’s highest national medal of honor.
“You, a Jew and a resistance fighter, you were overwhelmed with the most atrocious insults and even compared to Nazi scientists,” Macron said at the time. “But you held on for the love of freedom and science.”
Family Research Council
Mary Szoch, director of the Center for Human Dignity at The Family Research Council, a Christian nonprofit, encouraged people to pray that Baulieu sought redemption toward the end of his life.
“Etienne-Emile Baulieu’s work has led and continues to lead to the starvation and consequent deaths of thousands of unborn babies,” Szoch said in a statement provided to The Christian Post. “We know that God’s mercy is endless, and so we pray that Baulieu sought God’s mercy and forgiveness before he met the Creator.”
Kamala Harris
The former vice president and presidential candidate celebrated Baulieu’s legacy in a Saturday X post, crediting the abortion pill inventor with “chang[ing] the lives of so many women around the world.”
As The Washington Post reported Monday, Kamala Harris’ mother, Dr. Shyamala Gopalan Harris, worked with Baulieu in Paris in the 1980s, but not on the abortion pill. In his office, Baulieu kept a glass bowl from the former vice president, as well as various press clippings about mifepristone.
Heritage Foundation
Melanie Israel, a visiting fellow in the Richard and Helen DeVos Center for Life, Religion, and Family at The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think-tank, remarked that the deaths of millions of unborn children via the abortion pill are not something to celebrate.
According to a December 2024 report released by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, approximately 7.5 million women have used mifepristone to facilitate the death of their unborn children since the drug’s approval in 2000.
“Destruction of future generations isn’t progress, it’s a tragedy that we can never fully comprehend,” Israel told The Christian Post. “Thankfully, scientists and doctors and researchers who truly value human flourishing are countering Dr. Baulieu’s legacy through life-affirming breakthroughs like abortion pill reversal. Let’s celebrate that instead.”
