Facts make women's Plan B an easier pill to swallow

[flamingyouth]

By Susan Paynter
Seattle P-I Columnist

I get hot-behind-the-eyes angry picturing a woman being refused legal access to a safe, effective morning-after pill by a self-appointed moralist in a pharmacist's coat.

Other people get just as angry at the idea that anyone who is "pro-choice" thinks pharmacists ought to check their choice of beliefs at the employees' entrance. The thing is, anger isn't getting us any closer to two laudable goals: the right to travel a smooth, unencumbered road to emergency contraception. And the right to listen to our own personal Jiminy Crickets of conscience.

So it was both calming and encouraging to catch up late last week with Don Downing. He's the clinical associate professor in the University of Washington's Department of Pharmacy. I talked with him as he set out across the country into the eye of this storm.

He's also my drug of choice for soothing this headache.

Downing was just back from a swing through New England where he talked to as many pharmacists as he could grab by their white starched lapels. And he was on his way to give a speech in San Francisco at the annual meeting of the American Pharmacists Association. The title: "Common Sense Solutions to Ethical Dilemmas."

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/paynter/263463_paynt20.html

[MrModerate]

1. Interesting . . . Last I had heard, Plan B DOES prevent . . .

Implantation of an egg (in addition to preventing/suppressing ovulation). I'm not entirely sure I buy Downing's claim. Maybe, however, I'm just behind on the latest Plan B info.

Not that it makes that much difference to me -- I believe life begins at birth or, in extraordinary circumstances, when a fetus can survive outside the womb.

With regard to pharmacists, I don't have a lot of sympathy for those who choose to second-guess doctors' medical decisions. If they have moral objections to providing prescribed medications, they should seek some other line of work where they won't be faced with such ethical dilemmas.

[abluelady]

3. I think Downing is Wrong

EC can prevent implantation of a fertilized egg; and it can delay or inhibite ovulation and it can prevent fertilization or prevent implantation. All of these events occur before the beginning of a pregnancy, which medical science defines as the implantation of a fertilized egg in the lining of the uterus. This usually occurs 5 to 7 days after fertilization. It will not work if a woman is pregnant.

[IndyOp]

2. Great article! Thanks. (n/t)

[aden_nak]

4. A friend of mine works in a pharmacy in Missouri.

He lives in a pretty conservative area, too. But he's told me on several occasions that everyone working there, not just the actual pharmacists but EVERYONE working there is told as part of the job that they need to check their opinions and their ethics at the door, and that if they can't do that, they need to find another line of work. So this idea that pharmacists have this ethical question "sprung" on them is absurd.

[sam sarrha]

5. 2 women die in CA apparently from misusing, opposition wants it taken off

the market because it is unsafe,,,

but Cigarettes kill over 450,000 a year and there is no uproar and call for tobacco to be banned nor declared a controlled substance..

controlled in the context to only allow the hopelessly addicted a perscription till it kills them.

[kestrel91316]

6. Those recent two deaths WERE NOT due to use of Plan B,

the emergency contraceptive "morning after" pill!!!!!

They died after off-label (intravaginal rather than oral) use of RU-486 (I forget IT'S proprietary name) which is the medical abortion pill.

THEY ARE TWO VERY DIFFERENT THINGS!!!!!!!!!!!