I can see that the focus of the author's op-ed tirade is primarily about why the FDA is dragging its feet on approving Plan B for over-the-counter use, but the article raises another point. Maybe now would be a good time to remind the readers (especially the ones likely to use Plan B) that it is recommended to have it around before an emergency situation arises. It could save unneccessary grief if you call your GYN or planned parenthood center, part with the cash for an emergency supply of Plan B before you really need it. Keep it in the medicine cabinet as a back up for those inevitable Friday night condom breaking mishaps - I know, I've been there too!
--MD
05/15 |
i thought about writing something about this once because i got so irritated when the same thing happened to me five months ago. at the time, i was still a student and would, under normal circumstances, go to the health center to obtain such goods. but in this unfortunate case, it was three days before christmas and the health center wouldn't be open until a few days after new year's. i scrambled around like an amateur, and after much discussion with girls who embarrassingly hardly qualified as friends, i finally discovered that you can go on the planned parenthood website and get them to call in a prescription. basically, you just have to assume you're pregnant - rather than only spending $25 at the free clinic and knowing the truth- and drop a down payment of $40. then, within 24 hours you can pick up your prescription at wherever you told planned parenthood to call it in. that's another $40. good times.
i feel your pain; it was incredibly frustrating, especially for us because it originally started as an 'oh-shit-it-must-have-come-off' dig-around fest. but i'll admit my frustration peaked when i realized my extreme bad luck with the timing (no gynecologist in my college town since i had the health center to "depend" on). i'd love to think that it will one day be over the counter, not because i'm a whore who likes to worry about aborting fetuses regularly, but because i am a woman who simply wants the pragmatic option to choose if that problem occurs again.
--b.k.
05/15 |
I think the more serious issue here is why you need birth control for your dog.
--I_G
05/14 |
Carie, where are you? You are no longer an intern. You're not listed as a contributing writer and your bio appears neither under Hill nor Wilner. Since you are definitely not a figment of our imagination, wherefore art thou? You're the best.
--dj
05/14 |
Hi Carrie,
First off, let me tell you something you've probably already heard 400 times today: I love your writing. Now then, I'm writing in response to this week's Raw Nerve, about emergency contraception. I'm 18, a non virgin (though it's been so long, I'm considering going out for the sisterhood), and I've had the dreaded condom break happen. Take my advice--if this ever happens to you again, get yourself right to your local Planned Parenthood. They make you fill out a million papers, but there's bound to be one in your neighborhood, they're open Monday-Saturday all day, and Plan B costs 9 dollars. So I went in the next morning, bada bing, bada boom, no more worries. Keep the articles comin'...Love ya!
--AW
05/13 |
I live in California, and even though MAP is allegedly available over the counter, the majority of pharmacies still won't dispense it without a prescription (if they will dispense it at all.)If you are in CA or New Mexico this website can help you find a pharmacist who can actually help you: www.ec-help.org
--SP
05/13 |
"Responsible guys?" If these guys were truly responsible, they'd only be having sex with steady partners or with women who understood the methods and means of contraception.
How can you have sex with someone (even with a stranger)without being able to talk about about sex?
Americans have such a strange approach to sex and sexual politics.
--CC
05/12 |
I'll go a step further and say this pill should be available everywhere for responsible guys who don't want to make the nice young lady go out and track down the pill herself and/or end up footing the bill. Nightstand items: Condoms, KY, Tissues, Pill. Sounds pretty straightforward to me...
--CM
05/12 |
Dear Eva, Fortunately both my daughters are adults that I am quite proud of. I just think that given the climate of ever increasing sexual activity among increasingly younger people capable of inflicting unwanted fully- termed fetuses on society in general, MAPS should be available to a female when she begins to menstruate. A statement from her ob-gyn to the bitch pharmasist should make everyone happy. Would not this be the responsible thing to do? Eliminate the possibility for life to ever begin.
--RM
05/12 |
CC -- of course the patent holder is going to make an optimistic statement after the rejection, they are reassuring the investment community.
--ydb
05/12 |
Nerve - why the hysteria? The FDA in its own rejection letter to Barr Industries (Pan B's patent holder)practically issued a road map to approval and a detailed response as to why the drug was disapproved. In short, this was an FDA decision based on science and health concerns, not political pressure from social conservatives.
Look what the CEO of Barr Industries said after the decision:
"But the FDA has also provided us with pathways to a future approval, and we are committed to following the pathways until we get this product on the market over-the-counter."
Compare this sincere response to Nerve's "sky-is-falling" oped. Must be an election year.
Too bad the author is having a lot of "Grandmother-approving sex." Her frustation and passion is being released in silly online missives.
--CC
05/12 |
Amen Sister
--jlw
05/12 |
Well, I'd just like to point out that we are dealing with two unscrupulous agents here, the political FDA and the pharmeceuticals industry and we should be wary of both. The FDA has lat all sorts of unhealthy stuff pass muster. The Pharm industry happily sold women thalidomide. And then there's the dirty little secret nobody wants to admit: for some women, including the author and many women I know personally, the flood of hormones in the pill produce some seriously unpleasant side effects. Some women swim with the pill like fish in water. For those who don't? Well, there's the condom, with the risks like the one the author experienced, and the reduced sensation.
Just the price structure alone should serve to illustrate that this solution is not going to save poor people from unwanted pregnancy, so we should hold off on panicking on the FDA decision. The author of this article does not want to have children, fine, but she obviously could afford to, so I'll reserve my sympathy for those people who don't have any health insurance at all and therefore can't afford abortion or Plan B or anything else. The third world can't afford birth control, for the most part, which is why Catholic Latin America and definitely non-Catholic India have the same population explosion. So for the time being this is a luxury for middle and upper class people.
That said, Plan B is potentially a great way to sidestep the abortion debate. Let's face it, whatever you think of the morality or the legality of the procedure, it is invasive, frequently traumatic surgery that results in the death of a developing organism and some scarification of the mother. It is not something you would wish on anyone, and waving it around like it's feminism's First Sacrament is a bit sad. Whether that organism has rights and when those rights begin are other questions, but clearly everyone agrees that the best abortion policy is one that results in abortion being moot due to lack of demand. Plan B and other pregnancy prevention tools offer a way out of this deadlock, which is ripping the country in half, politically. But I'm fine with them taking all the time they need to test it. If they release it, and the fundies get ahold of a story about some 15 year old girl dying from it, this initiative will be a step forward followed by two steps back.
--PC
05/12 |
I can't tell you how pissed I am about the FDA's decision. Have been in similar situations as yours (with my husband, no less). In my case, it was Sat. night, again the wrong time of the month. I was able to order the pill online at http://www.getthepill.com/. You do an online survey and if you "pass" the on call physician will call in the prescription to the pharmacy of your choice. I was just glad that the one I chose did carry it. Please post this website if you can so that others can get the MAP, too.
Fucked up part? You have to pay $25 for the services, and my insurance did not pay for that OR for the pill.
--PHK
05/12 |
I for one would like to see actions taken by this and other like communities to stop these "moral authoritarians" from making legislation, and creating red tape that essentially tells us what we can and can not do with other bodies.
--SB
05/12 |
Planned Parenthood gives it to teens free.That saved my ass TWICE. Too bad I feel weird going there now that I am older. That is a wonderful organization.
--GDE
05/12 |
Really intelligent. I like this new column Carrie. It should be over the counter. Plan B is really effective, but no one is going to use it regularly as birth control. It made me feel pretty shitty. But I don't have kids.
--JS
05/12 |
right fucking on.
--amb
05/12 |
Thank God someone is commenting on the intersection of sex and public policy. The religious and social fringe conservatives are completely united and on-message about their agenda to pound sex back into their little patriarchal missionary procreative box, but the opposition has ben scattered too long. The left nibbles in pieces at this agenda, coming at it from reproductive freedom free speech and gay rights angles, but we're often divided and divisive -- and therefore neither united nor on-message. In some way, maybe you only see yourself as venting intermittently, or as only speaking for yourself, but you're talking in a space where a lot more of us ought to speak. Thank You.
Thomas H. Burt
thomashburt@mindspring.com
--THB
05/12 |
Don't anyone of you guys dare even think of firing Carrie Hill Wilner....EVER!
--S.S
05/12 |
For sure denying ALL women the possibility of getting the morning-after-pill over the counter, will surely stop girls too young giving blowjobs and wearing those tasteless bracelets. Let me applaud your sense of logic. And if all that stands between your adolescent daughters wearing bracelets and all that is a MAP, maybe you are not that fit to be a parent. But please don't let the rest of us suffer for your shortcomings.
--eva
05/12 |
You know Carrie, I think MAPS should be available to a female the minute she begins to menstruate. After all its her body and she is capable of bringing another unwanted life into this world. She can wear them on her wrist or somewhere else on her body. Posibbly next to some other symbolic item that might indicate that she might be willing to give a boy some oral sex or even more. Keep on rock'in in the free world!
--RM
05/12 |
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