Plan B OK Has Political Ramifications

(CBS/AP)  Women can buy the morning-after pill without a prescription, the government declared Thursday, a major step that nevertheless failed to quell the politically charged debate over access to emergency contraception.

The manufacturer, lawmakers and other advocates said they will press the government to allow minors to purchase the pills over the counter.

The Food and Drug Administration said that women 18 and older — and men purchasing for their partners — may buy the Plan B pills without a doctor's note, but only from pharmacies.

Girls 17 and younger still will need a prescription to buy the pills, the FDA told manufacturer Barr Pharmaceuticals Inc., in ruling on an application filed in 2003.

The compromise decision is a partial victory for women's advocacy and medical groups, which say easier access could halve the nation's 3 million annual unplanned pregnancies.

"While we are glad to know the FDA finally ended its foot-dragging on this issue, Planned Parenthood is troubled by the scientifically baseless restriction imposed on teenagers. The U.S. has one of the highest rates of teen pregnancy in the Western world anything that makes it harder for teenagers to avoid unintended pregnancy is bad medicine and bad public policy," president Cecile Richards said.

Opponents contend that nonprescription availability could increase promiscuity and promote use of the pills by sexual predators.

"If the FDA thinks that enacting an age restriction will work, or that the drug company will enforce it ... then they are living in a dream world," said Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America, who led the opposition.

Plan B contains a concentrated dose of the same drug found in many regular birth-control pills. Planned Parenthood estimates 41 other countries already allow women to buy emergency contraception without a prescription.

If a woman takes Plan B within 72 hours of unprotected sex, she can lower the risk of pregnancy by up to 89 percent. Plan B is different from the abortion pill: If a woman already is pregnant, Plan B has no effect.

"The so-called abortion pill works by interfering with a fertilized egg after it's been implanted in the wall of a uterus. This new pill works at various states before implantation," explains CBS News medical correspondent Dr. John LaPook.

But the approval of Plan B comes with conditions, reports CBS News correspondent Wyatt Andrews. Plan B won't be sold over the counter, but from behind the counter. Buyers have to ask the pharmacist for the drug, show an ID to prove their age, and the drug will not be sold in convenience stores. Barr Pharmaceuticals has also agreed to "track" whether the age restriction on sales is being enforced.

The earlier the pills are taken, the more effective they are. Allowing nonprescription sales mean women won't have to hustle to get a prescription, something especially difficult on weekends and holidays, advocates said.

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[phishfan86]

I think that maybe you all need to stop and think-the sale of this drug doesn`t cause unprotected ***- it is a safeguard if a condom breaks or you messed up your pills and didn`t realize it before. It is highly unlikely that someone who just chooses to go out and have *** whenever would go seek out this pill after since its just as easy to get a perscription for birth control which would have avoided the problem to begin with. Oh and since we are all getting down on church morals and such I`m sure you all know that it isn`t your place to condem anyone-that is God`s place if you beleive in church which would make the fact that you feel the need to say all of this garbage first of all completely hypocritical and secondly completly WRONG-If your using faith as way to judge then you have no faith

[sb19761]

That's very christian of you gossimer.

Get help.

[gossimer]

I stand by my earlier comment. If you choose to engage in an activity that you KNOW has the potentual to CREATE A LIFE, without protection to prevent it from happening in the first place, then you choose to DESTROY THAT LIFE, you are a murderer - plain and simple!

If you choose to engage in UNPROTECTED *** and risk contracting or spreading any disease, including AIDS, it's your OWN F'IN' FAULT for being so F'IN' STUPID!

But, hey, thanks for cleaning out the gene pool for the rest of us!

[liberalkelly]

the comments on this issue are just proving the point that this is a nation of people who stick their noses where they DON'T BELONG. the only thing the release of this pill will do is to give women another tool with which to control their OWN bodies. it is amazing to me that this is even the subject of litigation or arguement. my uteris is none of your business. it's funny to me that you are so quick to judge the morals of others when i am sure you are no saint. besides, i am sure the stigma of a woman having *** will always remain so, what are you worried about? you want another way to control women, their bodies- their minds. i say no and apparently, so does the FDA.

[sb19761]

Anyone against plan B, you need help.

You get yourselves so worked up and passionate about everyone's s.e.x. lives that it's disturbing beyond belief. You should really hear yourselves talk! For real! If it's not your private parts (or of your own children), shut the feck up - or kill yourselves!

Everytime I hear people like you talk, I feel like I need to take a shower. You're so passionate about people procreating and how they make love (and the positions they do it, at that!), that it wouldn't shock me if you listen through people's bedrooms with a stethoscope - just like so-called christians do to other people.

And you call label people unlike you as "nasty". Whatever. Look in the mirror.

[sb19761]

gossimer - you and those "christians" like you are nothing but total perverts.

You say *** is for pregnancy only - LOL! - and then you say those who boink and not get pregnant deserve to catch a deadly STD. That's very christian of you.

What I find quite disturbing - especially with you neo-con's and catholics is the fact that you're all perverts - trying to control everyone's coochie and ***. Your *** lives are so boring and dull that you have to worry yourselves to death about what everyone else is doing in their bedroom - procreating or not.

And that's real sweet - encouraging people to do anal ***. Gossimer, you're a world class pervert. Just like all so-called christians and catholics. Die!

[apdepetris]

All they have to do it pop a pill now - it's called birth control. I hate when people say that drugs like this or teaching kids about birth control increases promisuity. Teenagers are going to have *** if they want to regardless if you teach them about birth control, etc. or not. The point is to educate our children to try and help them make the right decisions and to protect them and keep them safe when they make the wrong ones. I remember a true story I saw on TV once about a young girl that became pregnant. She was afraid to tell her parents. She wanted to get an abortion but because of her age she would have to have parental conscent before she could have the abortion. Well, she ended up having a secret back-alley abortion. Because of the unsafe and unclean conditions of the abortion she developed an infection and died. I don't have an issue with the age restriction - I think young girls need guidance. The problem is most of them aren't going to want to tell their parents.

Trying to keep birth control and these kinds of drugs away from kids isn't going to stop them from having ***. You're just going to end up with kids with sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies.

[pat8722]

It's about killing a human being, and a fertilized egg that a woman won't allow to implant, is killing a human being. If conception occurs one second before a woman takes this drug (and sometimes it does), the woman is killing a human being when she takes this drug.

[gossimer]

I'm all for freedom of choice, however, what about the unborn children that have NO choice?

If people wish to have "unprotected" ***, they should do so in a such a way as to AVOID getting pregnant, either orally or up their bum! If that is not to their liking and safe *** is not to their liking, then they plain and simply should NOT be having *** in the first place! Because otherwise the whole PURPOSE of *** between a man and a woman IS TO GET PREGNANT!!!

Also, if people wish to engage in "unprotected" ***, I don't feel one *** bit sorry for them if they contract a potentually deadly disease, that's the choice they made. Better to eliminate them from the gene pool and be done with it! After all, if they choose to terminate an unplanned/unwanted pregnancy which they KNEW full well was a possibility when they had ***, they deserve to have the same fate happen to them.

[tonnie45]

Who gave these people the right to play God?