FDA to allow 17-year-olds to get 'morning-after' birth control over the counter

Women’s groups cheered the government’s decision to allow 17-year-olds to buy the “morning-after” emergency contraceptive without a doctor’s prescription, but conservatives denounced it as a blow to parental supervision of teens.

The Food and Drug Administration said Wednesday it would accept, not appeal, a federal judge’s order that lifts Bush administration restrictions limiting over-the-counter sales of “Plan B” to women 18 and older. U.S. District Judge Edward Korman ruled last month in a lawsuit filed in New York that President George W. Bush’s appointees let politics, not science, drive their decision to restrict over-the-counter access.

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8 comments on “FDA to allow 17-year-olds to get 'morning-after' birth control over the counter

  1. nwlayman says:

    One of the fallacies about Plan B is that it’s a once-in-a-while drug. I know a pharmacist with a large HMO. When dispensing Plan B it sometimes has the nickname “Plan F”, “Plan H” among people who work in the pharmacy— depending on the number of times the person has used it recently.

  2. dwstroudmd+ says:

    Fertilization is the entry of the sperm into the egg. That’s when the embryo begins, known as a zygote. Implantation of the resultant embryo into the uterine lining is now called conception, a change made to “legitimize” the work in fertility by the Jones’ et alia. Designed to prevent implantation of the embryo resultant from fertilization and nomenclature changes to say it prevents conception don’t change the way it works.

  3. mugsie says:

    I didn’t read the article. I was too disgusted to read it. I’m not shocked any more that this sort of thing is what’s happening in our world today, but it still makes me angry that people have dropped to such a low level of stupidity and lack or moral. This sort of thing is ENABLING the teens today to continue with their sexual endeavors. I know the world won’t get any better as long as HUMANS are in charge.

    Come, Jesus, Come!!!!

  4. SouthCoast says:

    I read the article. And nowhere in it did I see anything that would prohibit a 22-year-old predator from buying this poison to give to his 13-year-old “girlfriend”. I remember reading, in my youth, some 4 decades ago, a writing by a 19th century clergyman who was denouncing contraception as putting a tool into the hands of the seducer. This was held up, in the book in which I encountered it, as an example of Puritanical, up-tight, dinosaurian, sex-hating thinking. *sigh*
    The older I get, the more those slippery slopes I derided in my younger days begin to resemble the Khumbu Icefall.

  5. Bart Hall (Kansas, USA) says:

    For purposes of discussion, I shall proffer the following:

    a) There are well established brain-wave patterns the absence of which signifies death.

    b) Those patterns become present at a certain point in the development of a human embryo.

    c) For functional, practical purposes amongst people [i]not[/i] ascribing to God’s understanding of things, the presence of those brain waves should be what defines human life.

    d) For those of us ascribing to God’s understanding … do you intend to impose what amounts to a theocracy?

  6. Crypto Papist says:

    [blockquote]There are well established brain-wave patterns the absence of which signifies death.[/blockquote]
    But death only occurs after life has begun. The absence of such brain activity [i]prior[/i] to its development cannot define the starting point of life.
    [blockquote]Those patterns become present at a certain point in the development of a human embryo.[/blockquote]
    OK. But see above.
    [blockquote]For functional, practical purposes amongst people not ascribing to God’s understanding of things, the presence of those brain waves should be what defines human life.[/blockquote]
    Says you.
    [blockquote]For those of us ascribing to God’s understanding … do you intend to impose what amounts to a theocracy?[/blockquote]
    No. But I intend to support laws based on the scientific fact that a distinct human life begins at conception.

  7. Bart Hall (Kansas, USA) says:

    [i]For functional, practical purposes amongst people not ascribing to God’s understanding of things, the presence of those brain waves should be what defines human life.[/i] Says you.

    Hey Crypto, given we’re talking about non-believers here, would you prefer to ascribe to their current definitions of “life” … or mine? They don’t give a $#!+ about yours, and it will [i]never[/i] happen politically.

    The abortion battle is O-V-E-R. It ended in South Dakota, where the legislature passed (and the governor signed) what would be every pro-lifer’s best imaginable law. The people of South Dakota rose up against it, and forced a referendum. In a state where 60% of the [i]women[/i] voted for Bush in ’04 the law was overwhelmingly overturned. There is absolutely no political constituency for what you want. None. Whatever.

    You’re not going to get what you want in this country. NEVER. The question thus becomes: what can we do to protect the maximum number of lives possible? Your position goes nowhere.

    Our side lost, and lost badly. There will [i]never[/i] be a constitutional amendment, and even if Roe is overturned — which I believe it ought to be — there are at [i]most[/i] half a dozen states that could pass a pale imitation of the South Dakota law.

    You can support “laws … that a distinct human life begins at conception,” if you wish, but you are outnumbered by anywhere between 2-to-1 and 10-to-1 depending on where you are. So what’s next?

  8. Katherine says:

    Another thing that bothers me, besides the ethical dimension, about the easy distribution of this drug is the stories I heard, through my daughters, of girls who were given this by Planned Parenthood personnel and who didn’t use it properly, sometimes causing illness. This is NOT as harmless as aspirin, and girls having medical complications or even those who don’t could suffer harm from taking this without medical supervision. We can’t sell seventeen-year-olds tobacco or wine, but this is okay?