Morning after pill without a prescription?
The Food and Drug Administration is considering a request by the manufacturers of the Plan B morning-after pill to sell the drug without a prescription, The Washington Post is reporting.
Plan B, which is used to prevent pregnancies, can now be bought from a pharmacy. But women must have a prescription or prove that they are at least 17 years-old. Anyone under age 17 must have a prescription.
The request has been endorsed by some doctors, health advocates and members of Congress, but also has critics.
The FDA has until Wednesday to respond to the request, according to the Post article.
What do you think? Should Plan B be sold over-the-counter? Let us know.
Plan B contains a high dose of a hormone found in birth control pills and can lower the risk of pregnancy by up to 89 percent if taken within 72 hours of unprotected sex.
Comments
This product should be available without a prescription.
Posted by: Linda | December 7, 2011 10:34 AM
Plan B should absolutely be available without prescription, and ideally it should be much cheaper. I am not encouraging unprotected sex to any degree but the fact is that it does happen and women need to have options when it does. Since a large majority of the country is firmly against abortion, this seems to be our one chance to fix the mistake we made the previous night before it turns into a real, life changing problem.
Posted by: Liz Thomas | December 7, 2011 10:46 AM
Plan B should be made available over the counter without prescription. It is a responsible way for women to prevent a pregnancy and thus reduce the need for abortion. In addition, it will provide the needed medicine when so many pharmacists refuse to dispense it.
Posted by: Sara Love | December 7, 2011 11:32 AM
This has been available for some time over the counter in the Uk, and it is free, we know that people are having unprotected sex we need to find ways to remove barriers that prevent women from protecting themselves from an unplanned pregnancy, this should be a no brainier.
Posted by: Anna murphy | December 8, 2011 2:56 AM
Absolutely not.These pills are poison.Until a girl is eightteen,she is considered a child,and should be protected,from these drugs.
Posted by: kevin kelly | December 8, 2011 9:35 PM