Campaigners condemn morning-after pill ad
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Independent Minds
Young girls will be "particularly susceptible" to the controversial first TV advert for the morning-after pill, a campaign group warned today.
The broadcast will be shown after the 9pm watershed across a range of channels, including ITV, Channel 4 and Sky.
Viewers will see a woman waking up next to her partner and later asking for Levonelle One Step at a pharmacy.
While the advert was welcomed by some, Dominica Roberts, of the ProLife Alliance, said: "It is advertised inaccurately as emergency contraception, when in fact its major function is to cause the abortion of an embryo that has already been conceived, not as suggested by the name to prevent conception.
"Young girls will be particularly susceptible to this advertising campaign, and it is foolish to imagine they do not watch TV after the 9pm watershed."
The morning-after pill is available to women aged 16 and over through the NHS or to buy at most pharmacies.
Sexual health charity Marie Stopes International welcomed the first screening of the advert.
Spokeswoman Emily James said: "Marie Stopes International is delighted that emergency contraception, a vital component in the prevention of unintended pregnancies, will be advertised on TV.
"A condom breakage can be a nightmare for many women. Such adverts will inform and educate women about what to do in this situation.
"The sooner a woman takes emergency contraception after having unprotected sex, the more effective it is.
"Catapulting information on how to access and use emergency contraception into women's living rooms is an ideal way to ensure women will use it quickly and effectively."
Levonelle One Step is the only morning-after pill available to women in the UK.
Julie Bentley, chief executive of the FPA (formerly the Family Planning Association), said: "Ensuring women know where emergency contraception is available to them is important.
"It is also really important that they know it is most effective in the first 24 hours after having unprotected sex, and that it is available free from contraceptive clinics and GPs as well as at a cost from pharmacies."
A spokeswoman for manufacturer Bayer Schering Pharma said television advertising was an effective way of providing information about the morning-after pill.
She said: "If regular contraception fails, women need to know that emergency contraceptive options are available and where advice can be sought.
"However, our research has shown not all women are aware of the facts about the emergency contraceptive pill and that some women cross their fingers and hope for the best instead of taking action when their regular contraception lets them down.
"We believe TV advertising plays an important role in informing women about Levonelle One Step and how and where it can be obtained."
This article is from The Belfast Telegraph
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Comments
An abortion is when an embryo / foetus is removed from a woman's womb. The Morning After Pill prevents the embryo from attaching itself to the woman's womb, thus it is a form of contraception and not an abortion.
Women get pelvic, Pap, breast, and heart exams before they can fill or refill their hormone prescriptions whether for birth control or menopausal symptoms. How then can these same hormones in huge dosages all at one time be dispensed to very young girls without at least a health exam and parent's knowledge?
It's a health issue to many medical professionals as well as parents. I am a parent too and need to know if my child is using a drug that could harm her. A child's genetic vulnerablity and family history of diabetes, heart disease, breast cancer, etc. should be considered before dispensing these hormones as they can compound hormonal risks, especially if given in huge amounts all at one time. A baby already conceived may suffer birth defects as well. Only time will tell. I am afraid women, this time young girls, are going to be used again as Guinea pigs. Wasn't the tragic DES exposure of the 1950-70's and the recent WHI studies on HRT enough to learn from? Now we are playing and experimenting with progestin and this time with our children who are too young to know better.
Will our children one day look back and wish we would have researched more, and at least told them of possible very serious risks, especially in combination with other things such medications and alcohol, before allowing them to freely add them to their body chemistry and growing cells?
How many of these kids are having sex for fun and high on alcohol (a known teratogen, causing birth defects). Combine alcohol with hormones and you can have a deadly combination (blood clots, strokes, breast cancer).
See List of Known and Probably Carcinogens at: American Cancer Society: http://www.cancer.org/docroot/PED/conte
Suzanne L. Adams, CT (ASCP)
Medical Cytologist and nutritionist
The Art of Cytology
http://www.i2k.com/~suzanne/hormones.ht
2. Teratogen means it causes birth defects, thus NOT taking the pill and "risking it" while still drinking would result in birth defects, while taking the pill would mean no fetus develops, thus no teratogenic effect - this is MORNING AFTER, not normal contraceptive pills; presumably somebody who got the pill would be told not to drink for the next 48 hours or so until it cleared their system.
3. I agree that the parents of younger children should be informed; however if you do not know your child is having sex, you are not in a position to help them; if you do not think a 16-18 year old in today's US or UK is having sex, you are seriously out of touch, however sad a reflection on society that may be.
4. This is not a guinea pig situation, as these pills have been used for many years - what we are talking about is a small change (1-2 years) in the age and prescription status of the drugs.
5. Alcohol combined with a one-off morning after pill such as levonorgestrel is not going to cause blood clots - the long-term contraceptive pill may do over long periods, but again this is not the issue here.
6. This post brings up some valid issues, but is worded in a highly deceptive way that attempts to turn a moral objection to abortion (morning after contraception is effectively abortion) into a scientific objection, which is entirely invalid. Personally I am undecided as to whether early abortion or unwanted children uncared for is the lesser of two evils, however as a scientist I strongly object to the manipulation of scientific language to deceive frightened young women who may be considering the morning after pill. If you are against abortion, that is an entirely reasonable position and you should be honest about saying so, instead of cloaking your position with dishonest language in the implication that you are involved in research in this field. Such dishonest language is a discredit to your beliefs and to whichever religion you presumably represent, which I would hope values honesty.
And as always, women bear the brunt of contraception & bear the consequences of mishaps...
Takes 2 to sex... Boys & men need to be more proactive & responsible for their share... Condoms, anyone?????????
One thing should be stressed here that those people wholly positive for the morning-after pill is that it is not like a piece of candy which you swallow and everything is fine. It is quite an extreme medication and something that should be reserved for genuine emergencies and not be seen as something that is easy to fall back on as the rather casual attitude of Julie Bentley and Emily James implies.
My point is medical doctors need to help determine if a young girl should take these hormones. They should not be left out of the cycle of care. If there is a medical issue after the use of these pills, the doctor certainly should not then be sued!
The FDA is in bed with Big Pharma. This is just another way for them to make money.
My point with regards to your profession, which I made a little too forcefully I think (sorry, thought you were a right-winger in disguise!), was that a year's training to recognise changes in cells (which is undoubtedly very skilled work) and a degree in other (non-medical) fields of science (which in the US includes a lot of general, non-science related courses as well) does not give you the same knowledge as a specialist medical doctor or researcher in the field, which I took to be the implication of your post. I have a friend who is a chemistry PhD and works on battery cells. One year of additional training would therefore certify him as a cytologist, and he is also a research scientist already according to the government. He would hardly be considered an expert on the effects of hormones, however. I don't mean to belittle your job, which is clearly very skilled and very important work, just to point out that your specific medical training does not seem to qualify you to make some of the claims you made in your original post, but then again I am not a doctor either.
The UK used to have a unified bargaining system, which gave our health service more power over the drug companies, but it has now been broken down into regional systems and commercialised, so we are unfortunately headed towards something like the FDA situation you describe, I think.
It is not so much the one year cytology internship (40 hrs/week for 12 months) that gives a cytologist the critical skills needed to identify cancer and related changes in cellular specimens, including hormonal changes in cervical cells, but the years and years of experience on the job screening a variety of cellular specimens and seeing many, many cases of cancer and associated changes. The average pathologist has far less training in cytology than one year (often only 2 weeks training or a month's rotation). There are many, many areas of pathology that have to be studied, and each area (cytology being one) is given only so much time in medical residency. Cytologists are allied health care professionals, meaning they are allies to the pathologists, helping to find the cancer and first signs of cellular abnormalities. Pathologists do not have the time nor training to screen the cytology slides themselves and they rely heavily on our opinion of every single cytology case. Their job is to make the final decision on the cytology cases that we present to him/her that we think are abnormal with our complete written descriptive opinion of them. Cytologists are generally allowed to sign out the negative cervical Paps ("gyn" cases) without the pathologist seeing them. However, all abnormal appearing gyns and all non-gyn Paps (lung, urine, breast, brain, organ aspirations, etc.), regardless of being considered normal or not by the cytologist, are screen/reviewed again by the pathologist and signed out by him/her. It is a difficult job to determine normal from abnormal cells because they are all different, depending on the age and conditions of each individual patient, the organ the cells were aspirated from, and/or the epithelium they are scraped from. Sometime, cancer cells are very small, smaller than normal cells, so machines cannot do a good job based on any size deviations. Many cells can look normal and not be normal and vise versa. That is why we have further testing (eg: biopsies, special stains, etc). The cytology technologist is considered to have the most difficult (complicated) test examined in the pathology laboratory. Throughout the years cytologists have had to work very hard with the Health Care Financing Admin., the CDC, etc. to let them know what we are responsible for in the cytology lab and how important quality control measures are so screening for cancer is done accurately and carefully. Just as the physical therapist is an expert in his/her area of specialty so is a cytologist in the pathology laboratory. We are all helping the doctor come to the right conclusions and we care very much about their welfare and ultimate responsibilities.
PS: I voted for Obama for his protective stance on the environment. My concern is the impact of all the hormones and hormone-like chemicals (EDC's such as Bisphenol-A in plastics, etc.)that are showing up in our waterways and in our food chain. I am concerned about reproductive health and the welfare of future generations, including animals and plants.
I understand the need for birth control but am worried about the misuse of these drugs in young girls who have not been examined by their doctors first.
See these interesting articles on endocrine disruption chemicals (EDC's): http://www.ehponline.org/members/2005/1
and http://www.antijen.org/transadvocate/id
suzanne (doctor's wife of 15 years).
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/n
It is a slippery slope and I fear that it will result in the abuse of embryonic research, as how can you shun using embryos for cloning and other research if you are advertising deprivation of the basic human rights for potential lives, the right to live.