The U.S. abortion rate could be cut in half if emergency contraception was available without a prescription, Sarah Johnston, an associate professor of internal medicine at the University of Kansas School of Medicine-Wichita, wrote last week in a commentary on our Opinion pages. But as she noted, the FDA went against the recommendations of its advisory committees and national medical associations, and put the decision on hold.
Johnston argued that Kansans who care about abortion should be outraged. But many pro-lifers oppose the contraception because they think it will encourage promiscuity and because they think it is a chemical abortion — even though a study by the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm showed that Plan B prevents ovulation and doesn’t cause a fertilized egg to be expelled.
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
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13 Comments
Is this the only medication the FDA isn’t approving based on politics?
Another comment about antiabortion violence.
In Shreveport, LA a firebomb was thrown into an abortion clinics parking lot.
This story is almost invisible in the media. Why?
It would appear to be a clear case of domestic terrorism.
Is this the way incidents of this kind will be treated again? Silence against the people who create this violence. A different set of laws because after all, it’s horrible that we have abortion providers?
Why don’t we deal with the issue without the violence. Why can’t the FDA make a decision based not on politics, but on necessity?
If this one medication is held up on politics, what other medications are being held up?
Could there be a medication for cancer (pick your own illness), but the cancer industry sees it as a threat to their future?
This should be questions we are asking, not ignoring because Plan B is a push button topic.
Interesting that the free-marketers aren’t all outraged against this egregious offense against personal freedom.
Is it because it mainly benefits women or because the church-y moralists they’ve allied themselves with might break ranks if they actually stuck by their principles and gave the consumer what she wants?
A woman can use regular birth control pills to do the same thing as plan B. The info is one the internet or a woman can call her gynecologist. The idea that plan B promotes promiscuity is stupid. It’s worth FDA approval if it would reduce unwanted pregnancy and abortion rates.
What do you expect? These are the children and grandchildren of the preachers who demanded that penicillin be banned because it cured syphilis, and thus was created by Satan to thwart God’s punishment for fornication. Now it’s Plan B, for exactly the same reason. A return to the Dark Ages, and bloodthirsty theocracy really appeals to them.What medications are available, and to whom, is strictly a medical decision, and not a tool for enforcing someone’s version of morality. Any FDA member who can’t decide on medical evidence alone, or any pharmacist who uses his profession to make moral decisions for someone else, should get out of the business and leave it to the professionals!
Sum1, nothing surprises me anymore when it comes to the FDA, drug companies, and meds. How many drugs are the FDA stopping because of politics? An even better question might be, how many possible cures have the drug companies discovered but will not move forward with because they can make more money treating the diseases or conditions?
It angers me when I look at the amount of drugs my 80+ year-old mother takes. One to take care of the condition, and three more to take care of the side effects of the first. Then more to combat the side effects of those. Multiply that times several conditions, then charge an arm and a leg for each med, and there’s definitely profit–huge profit.
“Medical”, including hospitals, doctors (the cost of their insurance is astronomical), medication and insurance for all, is big business. One big, money-sucking racket.
I’m on Bush’s Healthcare Plan: Don’t Get Sick HMO. Or is that PPV?
(Rant over…)
I think the controversy is mostly about the whether or not “Plan B” should be available without a prescription, because it’s already available with one. There are legitiment concerns about drugs like this being available without the supervision of a doctor. It’s a hard situation, because if a woman needs to get a prescription, she may embarrassed or afraid and not follow through. If she can just buy it over the counter and there is a physical reason she shouldn’t take the drug, then it could be dangerous. Artifical hormones are not harmless drugs, you can’t get them in any form right now without a being under the supervision and care of a doctor.
Da,There isn’t anything out there that somebody can’t find a way to misuse. I read today about the increase in liver failure caused by people taking too much tylenol, but I have yet to hear about the FDA taking it off the OTC market. The reason Plan B is prescription only is purely abortion politics. The FDA’s own advisory committee, as well as most of the medical community, backed dispensing it over the counter.Getting a doctor’s appointment and finding a pharmacist to fill the prescription within the 72hrs it’s effective has been difficult to impossible for many women- and the anti-abortion fanatics want it kept that way!
I still think it’s dangerous. A woman can’t get birth control pills or hormone replacement therapy without a prescription.Aspirin and Tylenol don’t have the potential for fatal side effects UNLESS they’re misused. Not so with hormones, you can take them as prescribed and still have major problems. But I understand about the time constraints, the importance of easy access, etc. Like I said before, it’s a really tough issue. I’m not sure how I feel about it.
Da,Yes, it’s a tough issue, but it would be a lot easier to deal with if it weren’t so politicized.And tylenol and aspirin, as well as all the other anti-inflamatory drugs, are potentially hazardous, even when used as directed. Check it out- the figures are scary!
The same ones fighting it approval, are the ones that forced that hospitals that receive government money can not tell a rape victim about the the drug. The arguement is that it is abortion. Even though at the stage it is there is nothing to abort. It stops a child from being formed so it is abortion.
Thank you R.R. once again!
DamoonThere have been cases where the woman was denied Plan B because her pharmacist believed it was a moral choice for them.
This needs to be availible to women without perscriptions. The only reason it isn’t is politics, pure and simple.
Hormones aren’t in the same league as aspirin or Tylenol; there can be life threatening side effects to hormone use, like blood clots and cancer. Having easy access without the supervision of a doctor could be dangerous, and some women shouldn’t take hormones at all. I’d like to know what other countries have experienced by selling it over the counter.