Audit Questions FDA Decision on Morning-After Pill
From CNN.com:
Personally, I favor making the "morning-after pill" available over the counter. While some consider the drug a form of abortion, the morning-after pill stops a possibly fertilized egg from implanting in the uterine wall. Implantation is a necessary second step in the process of conception: Many eggs are fertilized, but do not implant; thus, a pregnancy does not result.
As I understand it, the morning-after pill is meant to be taken shortly after a sexual encounter that might result in the pregnancy. In some cases an egg has not been fertilized anyway, so the pill is irrelevant. In some cases the pharmaceutical prevents the implantation of an egg that would not have attached itself to the uterine wall anyway. Finally, in other cases the morning-after pill stops a fertilized egg from developing into a viable human being.
Because the pill is taken during the process of conception in cases where a pregnancy might not have resulted anyway, I do not think that taking the morning-after pill is equivalent to having an abortion. In fact, I think that this drug, if it is easily accessible, could be a valuable tool for reducing the number of abortions. Also, given the prevalence of date rape, I think that having the morning-after pill available over the counter is important.
At any rate, I am bothered by the possibility that the FDA cut corners to keep the morning-after pill behind the counter and off the shelves. CNN reports:
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Federal health officials didn't follow normal procedures in rejecting over-the-counter sales of the morning-after pill -- and some documents suggest the decision was made even before scientists finished reviewing the evidence, congressional investigators reported Monday.
Politics trumped science, immediately charged long-suspicious members of Congress who had requested the independent audit.
Personally, I favor making the "morning-after pill" available over the counter. While some consider the drug a form of abortion, the morning-after pill stops a possibly fertilized egg from implanting in the uterine wall. Implantation is a necessary second step in the process of conception: Many eggs are fertilized, but do not implant; thus, a pregnancy does not result.As I understand it, the morning-after pill is meant to be taken shortly after a sexual encounter that might result in the pregnancy. In some cases an egg has not been fertilized anyway, so the pill is irrelevant. In some cases the pharmaceutical prevents the implantation of an egg that would not have attached itself to the uterine wall anyway. Finally, in other cases the morning-after pill stops a fertilized egg from developing into a viable human being.
Because the pill is taken during the process of conception in cases where a pregnancy might not have resulted anyway, I do not think that taking the morning-after pill is equivalent to having an abortion. In fact, I think that this drug, if it is easily accessible, could be a valuable tool for reducing the number of abortions. Also, given the prevalence of date rape, I think that having the morning-after pill available over the counter is important.
At any rate, I am bothered by the possibility that the FDA cut corners to keep the morning-after pill behind the counter and off the shelves. CNN reports:
The independent Government Accountability Office reviewed FDA's first rejection, uncovering what they called "unusual" decision-making. Among the findings:Conflicting accounts of whether the decision was made months before scientific reviews were completed. Unusual involvement from high-ranking agency officials. Three FDA directors who normally would have been responsible for signing off on the decision did not do so because they disagreed with it.
posted by Tinley | 3:32 AM
1 Comments:
Hi Josh,
A quick praise for some excellent blogging you have published lately. Yay!
I won't take exception to your specific conclusion about the use of the morning after pill and its availability at the moment, but I do wish to counter some of the word usage. You mention several times that implantation is the final step in conception. That is factually incorrect. It is a step necessary for the beginning of pregnancy in a strict medical context. In that same context, conception has already taken place when the egg is fertilized by the sperm. That is the exact moment that a new human life form has been created. The implantation process is accurately seen as the attachment of this new life to it's host life form, the mother, via the uterine wall. A miscarriage is said to take place at any time the newly conceived life is unable to attach or remain attached to it's host.
It may relieve some people's conscience to think that they did not terminate a newly created life by making use of this medication. But the reality is that they do not know if they did or not. As a procedure to avoid pregnancy it is a gamble not unlike Russian roulette. For those people who hold all life in any phase of development in high regard this is important to know.
There are, in my opinion regrettably, many people who do not concern themself with the value of human life in it's earliest phases. For them there is no logical reason not to use such a medication. That doesn't mean that the medication itself is without side-effects, though. As I understand it, the side effects for this medication, in any other context than birth control, would warrant it's restricted access via prescription by a doctor. It would be an egregious error to make the medication available OTC simply for the sake of quite, private birth control. In my mind it would be as responsible as selling vacuum aspiration and cutting kits for do it yourself abortions. The issue of public safety apart from the moral implications take precedence. The medication in this case is far from simple cold medicine.
As a final thought about words I would like to point out that "abortion" itself refers to a specific kind of medical procedure. Even though it has picked up a lot of social and moral baggage it isn't the procedure but it's application that has moral significance. Possessing the atomic bomb isn't a problem itself, using that bomb against a society is. The justificaton and moral implications after the fact are the legacy we are left to deal with.
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