Plan B backlash.

Byline: The Register-Guard

Concern for women's health has consistently taken a back seat to religious sensitivities in the Food and Drug Administration's politically motivated decisions on emergency contraception. The FDA's inexcusable rejection of solid science throughout its consideration of Barr Laboratories' request to sell the Plan B emergency contraceptive without a prescription has now dealt women another serious setback.

Assistant Commissioner Susan Wood, director of the FDA's Office of Women's Health, resigned in disgust last week in the wake of newly appointed FDA Commissioner Lester Crawford's embarrassing equivocation on Plan B. After acknowledging during his confirmation hearings that the science proving the safety and effectiveness of Plan B was settled, Crawford promised an up-or-down decision on nonprescription access by Sept. 1.

When the momentous day arrived, Crawford came down with a case of yellow fever. After two years of FDA delay, flip-flopping and obfuscation, and despite the agency's own expert advisory panel's 23-4 vote in 2003 to approve over-the-counter sales of Plan B without age restrictions, Crawford announced that his decision would be "indefinitely postponed." His excuse - that the decision posed unprecedented regulatory problems - was a flimsy smokescreen behind which pressure from religious conservatives and abortion opponents could clearly be seen.

Wood, bless her heart, was outraged.

"I have spent the last 15 years working to ensure that science informs good health-policy decisions. I can no longer serve as staff when scientific and clinical evidence, fully evaluated and recommended for approval by the professional staff here, has been overruled," Wood wrote to FDA staff.

If you're new to the culture war controversy over Plan B or haven't followed it because you wouldn't use it, here's what the scientists have to say. Plan B is emergency contraception that works much like an extra-strength birth control pill. It must be taken in two doses, the first within 72 hours after intercourse, followed by another tablet 12 hours later.

Plan B does not interfere with fertilized eggs. It prevents pregnancy by suppressing ovulation. If a fertilized egg has already implanted in the uterus, Plan B has no effect and does not terminate the pregnancy.

Some religious conservatives and abortion opponents claim that in isolated instances, Plan B can prevent an already fertilized egg from implanting in the uterus, thereby "aborting" a conceived human being. Breast-feeding can do the same thing, but this flimsy argument hardly bears refuting. There are many reasons why fertilized eggs fail to implant. The medical definition of pregnancy is that it begins with the implantation of a fertilized egg in the uterus.

The "life begins at conception" argument being used against Plan B may resonate with some conservative Christians in President Bush's base, but it's far from a universally accepted religious position on when life begins.

In the Jewish faith, the Talmud states that before 40 days, what is in the uterus is akin to water, not a human being. The Old Testament book of Genesis describes God breathing into a lump of clay to create Adam, which led to the Christian belief that life began when organs formed. For much of Christian history, the official church position held that a child's life began at the "quickening," when the mother first became aware of its movement.

Public health policy must be based on science, not Scripture. Research indicates that widespread availability of Plan B in the United States could prevent up to 1.7 million unintended pregnancies and 800,000 abortions a year. Allowing religion to influence the decision to make Plan B available without a prescription is dangerous hypocrisy that increases both the number of abortions performed and the health dangers women face from complications of pregnancy.