‘Women no longer have to be 18 and older or have a prescription to purchase the controversial morning-after contraceptive pill, the Food and Drug Administration said Wednesday. Last month, a federal court ordered that the emergency contraception pill be made available over the counter to those 17 and up, the agency said in a statement on its Web site. U.S. District Judge Edward Korman had also asked the FDA to consider whether the pill should be available to women of all ages without a prescription. He said that this decision was best left to the agency rather than a federal district judge. He also blasted the FDA for abandoning its own procedures with respect to making decisions on the pill’s over-the-counter status, noting the “unusual involvement of the White House in the Plan B decision-making process.” He said that the plaintiffs in the case presented “unrebutted evidence of the FDA’s lack of good faith” toward the application to switch Plan B from prescription to non-prescription use. “This lack of good faith is evidenced by, among other things, (1) repeated and unreasonable delays, pressure emanating from the White House, and the obvious connection between the confirmation process of two FDA commissioners and the timing of the FDA’s decisions; and (2) significant departures from the FDA’s normal procedures and policies … as compared to the review of other switch applications in the past 10 years,” Korman wrote. In his order, Korman wrote that, “No useful purpose would be served by continuing to deprive 17-year-olds access to Plan B without a prescription. Indeed, the record shows that FDA officials and staff both agreed that 17-year-olds can use Plan B safely without a prescription. The FDA’s justification for this age restriction, that pharmacists would be unable to enforce the prescription requirement if the cutoff were age 17, rather than 18, lacks all credibility.” That decision, according to Planned Parenthood Federation of America President Cecile Richards,  is “a strong statement to American women that their health comes before politics. And that’s the way it should be. This decision is common-sense policy that will help reduce the number of unintended pregnancies and protect the health and safety of all women.”

TAGS: contraceptive, FDA, Judge Edward Korman, morning-after pill, Plan-B

Comments (9)