To expand a bit on something referenced yesterday:
Seventeen-year-olds will soon be allowed to buy morning-after contraceptive pills without a doctor's prescription after federal drug regulators complied with a judge’s order and lowered the age limit by a year. The decision on Wednesday by the Food and Drug Administration, which overturns one of the most controversial health rulings of the Bush administration, was scorned by abortion opponents and hailed by their abortion rights counterparts.
Also in the news, a sign of what a new administration, judicial review, and advocacy organizations will wrought, "Plan B" will not be available to 17 year-olds without a prescription. Plan B was a partisan/moral football by the Bush Administration, allowing this pill that needs to be taken within 72 hours (or even 24 for best efficiency) to be sold over the counter even for adults a drawn out process, a process the judge in this case deemed unreasonable, and in part politically motivated. Controversy also arose because some saw this as an abortion drug, even though it generally works before fertilization, and even when (if) it does not, regular birth control pills do as well.
What the new policy can mean, and why it very well can be expanded to younger teens is discussed here, a taste:
My first trip for a Plan B pill was a cold, dreary bus ride up Lake Shore Drive to the Planned Parenthood in downtown Chicago. I remember looking out over the frozen lake, wondering what would happen if I couldn't get the pill that afternoon. I was 15, and not ready to deal with making the decision between pregnancy and abortion. (At 22, I can confidently say that I'm still not.)
Luckily, as a teen I was informed enough to know what to do. It took me two attempts to make it to the center when it was open—closed every other Sunday—and the longer I waited, the less effective I knew the pills would be. I can't imagine how much terror would have been avoided had I been able to stop into the 24 hour Walgreens with my boyfriend immediately after the condom broke.
But increasing access of emergency contraception for teens is not just about making a girl feel less anxious about taking the pills; it’s about preventing pregnancies.
Holding it back from teens is counterproductive and irrational:
Russell Turk, M.D., an OB/GYN in Connecticut, made the argument to make it available to girls as young as 13. According to some individuals, giving EC to young teens is outrageous. Therefore, to get a pill they need a prescription—but this doesn’t make any sense, he says, because the pill is safer than the alternative. "Widespread availability of the morning-after pill has the potential to prevent unplanned pregnancy and abortion – both of which pose far greater risk and hardship to teen girls."Bristol Palin* and others can tell us the value of a sound reproductive health policy, including the dubious nature of federal funding of abstinence only education, and the imperfect use of protection during teenage sex. This is a step in the right direction.
---
* Is that a good reference? There is a type of "man bites dog" flavor to BP as well as a making of a "gotcha," but it doesn't really change that it has bite. She was seen as a hero by some for having the baby, so let's see what she thinks as a whole.
I guess the possible blowback suggests references of this type are a bit dubious, though oh come on -- people are thinking about certain individuals in the news, and putting them in context is not bad pool. Feigning insult or being insulted in a conveniently selective fashion does not change that.