On January 14, 2008, the U.S. Supreme Court issued an order declining to take up the issue of whether terminally ill patients have a “fundamental right” “protected by the U.S. Constitution” of access to experimental drugs that have not yet been fully approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The decision was a setback for WLF, which filed the petition for review on behalf of itself and the Abigail Alliance for Better Access to Developmental Drugs, a patients-rights group. The court’s action marks the latest chapter in a five-year WLF effort to establish rights for terminally ill patients. Because of FDA’s refusal to recognize such a right, WLF filed suit in 2003 on behalf of itself and the Abigail Alliance. In May 2006, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled in WLF’s favor on the issue. But in August 2007, a divided appeals court sitting en banc reversed that decision.