Bush's FDA denies over-the-counter status for Emergency Contraception!
For immediate release May 7, 2004:
Statement of Kelli Conlin, Executive Director of NARAL Pro-Choice New York, on the Food and Drug Administration’s Decision to Deny Over-the-Counter Status for Emergency Contraception
Politics Trump Science at the Bush FDA,
New York State Senate Needs to Act to Make Emergency Contraception Accessible
“On Thursday, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) ignored the advice of the nation’s leading medical authorities, including the American Medical Association and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, as well as its own expert advisory committees. The FDA overlooked sound scientific evidence pertaining to a method of birth control and denied American women a second chance to prevent unintended pregnancy and reduce the need for abortion.
By refusing to make emergency contraception available to American women without a prescription, the FDA and the Bush Administration have let politics trump scientific evidence.
New York can right the wrong done to women on Thursday. In the last two years, the New York State Assembly has passed, by an overwhelming and bi-partisan majority, a bill that would make emergency contraception available directly through trained pharmacists and registered nurses. It is time for the New York State Senate to demonstrate its leadership on this issue and its commitment to New York women. The Senate must pass S.3339 (Hoffmann) swiftly and decisively to ensure that women have access to emergency contraception when and where they need it. Through its action, the Senate will show its commitment to reducing unintended pregnancy and abortion, a goal we can all agree on.
Thursday’s action by the FDA will force women to play ‘beat the clock’ if their contraception fails or if they had sex when they didn’t expect or want to. Accidents don’t discriminate – they happen to single and married women; mothers and daughters; women in their teens, 20s, 30s and throughout their reproductive years. The FDA and the Bush Administration are keeping a safe, effective and proven method of back-up birth control out of reach for American women who need it in a timely manner to prevent pregnancy, including thousands of women who are the victims of sexual assault each year.”
In 2000, emergency contraception is believed to have prevented as many as 50,000 abortions, even though only 2% of women ever reported using this method at that time. Experts estimate that widespread access to and use of emergency contraception could prevent as many as half of the nearly 3 million unintended pregnancies that occur in the United States each year, including as many as 700,000 pregnancies that now result in abortion. The current requirement that women obtain a prescription for emergency contraception is a significant barrier to greater use of this time sensitive treatment – doctor’s offices are typically closed when women are most likely to experience a contraceptive failure.
In December 2003, the FDA’s Advisory Committees on Nonprescription Drugs and Reproductive Health Drugs unanimously voted that Plan B® is safe for use in a non-prescription setting. In a vote of 23 to 4, these expert advisory committees recommended that the FDA approve Plan B® for over-the-counter use.
“Clearly, medical and scientific consensus means little to the Bush FDA. The proven public health benefit of over-the-counter emergency contraception access for women of all ages strikes no chord with an agency and an administration driven by the politics of misinformation, misguided speculation and scare tactics.”
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