Easy access to ‘emergency contraception’ fails to reduce pregnancy rate

SCHAUMBURG, Ill. — The American Medical Association is pushing for over-the-counter status for emergency contraception despite research that shows such access does not dramatically reduce unwanted pregnancies

The AMA had long contended that easy access to “emergency contraception” would dramatically reduce unwanted pregnancies. But in a Jan. 5 study published in the “Journal of the American Medical Association,” researchers found that young women who were given packets of “morning after pills” had pregnancy rates six months later that were virtually the same as women who had to get a prescription or go to a clinic to obtain the drug.

Officials at AMA have pushed for over-the-counter sales of emergency contraception, and say the findings of the recent study don’t change their minds. Dr. Tina Raine, lead researcher of the study, said that the study also showed that women who had easy access to the contraceptives didn’t take more sexual risks or get more sexually transmitted diseases as some have feared, prompting her to decided that “it seems unreasonable to restrict access to EC to clinics.”

Concerned Women for America analyst Wendy Wright, an opponent of such contraceptives, disagreed.

“Why make EC easily available and put women’s health at risk if it doesn’t even reduce what the women fear, which is pregnancy?” she told the Washington Times.

Emergency contraception is a high-dose birth-control pill taken within 72 hours of unprotected sexual intercourse. The pills can interrupt ovulation or fertilization of an egg. The pills can also prevent the implantation of a fertilized egg, in effect terminating a very early pregnancy.

In 2003, Barr Pharmaceuticals, the manufacturer of a brand of emergency contraceptive called Plan B, asked the FDA to approve the drug for over-the-counter sales. The FDA rejected the request, saying it was concerned about teen-age girls taking the pills without medical supervision.

Barr Pharmaceuticals has reissued its request, and the FDA is expected to issue another response in this month.

Wright in a separate interview with CitizenLink said that Concerned Women for America will continue to lobby against easy access to emergency contraceptives.

“We need to encourage young women to make the right decisions rather than making it easy for them to further engage in risky behaviors,” she said.

Published, February 2005

Christian Examiner™, P.O. Box 2606 El Cajon, CA 92021 • 619-668-5100 • Fax 619-668-1115
Email: info@christianexaminer.com • Web site: www.christianexaminer.com