Ella Abortion Drug Now Available, Called Contraceptive Pill

National   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Dec 1, 2010   |   2:21PM   |   Washington, DC

The Ella abortion drug, which has been billed by its distributor, the FDA and abortion advocates as an improved emergency contraceptive pill, is now available across the United States via prescription.

Watson Pharmaceuticals, based in New Jersey, announced today that ella (ulipristal acetate) is now available for women to obtain and use up to five days following unprotected intercourse or contraceptive failure.

While the company maintain the drug works only as a contraceptive agent, five days is sufficient time for conception to take place and confer into existence the life of a unique human being who needs only a nine month pregnancy to be born.

“ella® is the first truly new emergency contraceptive option for U.S. women since 1999. It has a unique sustained efficacy profile and offers women an additional therapeutic option for preventing unintended pregnancy,” Wilkinson, Executive Vice President of Watson Global Brands, said in a statement LifeNews.com obtained.

“We are committed to making this innovative prescription-only emergency contraceptive option available to women as soon as possible and supporting the availability of ella® in ways that emphasize education and access,” he said.

The drug company indicated the ella® launch will be phased over the next several months and will include physician educational initiatives, advocacy outreach and educational websites for consumers.

Watson wants the abortion drug to be available immediately and indicates “stocking efforts have ensured the product will be available immediately by prescription at most retail pharmacies, clinics, as well as online via www.KwikMed.com, a licensed online pharmacy.”

Kristan Hawkins, the president of Students for Life of America and a national leader against the ella drug, responded to the news in a comment to LifeNews.com.

“The fact that ella is now on sale across the country means that millions of women are at risk for dangerous side effects of this new abortion drug,” she said. “Make no mistake about it, ella, the new abortion drug, will be marketed on college campuses nationwide, and young women across America will be put in serious danger.”

“It is appalling that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved this drug which is dangerous for women and fatal for preborn children. The FDA needs to rescind its approval this new abortion drug before women and children are harmed,” Hawkins added.

Ella has been available in Europe as an emergency contraceptive since October 2009, where it is marketed by its developer,  HRA Pharma, as ellaOne.

But the FDA, when it approved the drug, made its decision based on data from two phase III clinical trails the French drug maker HRA Pharma sponsored.

The studies showed 1.51 percent of women using ella (or ellaOne in Europe) became pregnant when using the drug 72 hours after intercourse while 2.81 percent became pregnant when using the Plan B drug.

However, Wendy Wright, the president of Concerned Women for America, said the ella abortion drug maker could not answer other questions.

“The drug sponsor couldn’t provide information on whether Ella can cause birth defects, or what happens to women who are pregnant who take it. And yet the committee strongly recommended not giving a woman a pregnancy test,” she told LifeNews.com after the hearing.

“In Europe, Ella is contra-indicated (not to be used) in pregnancies. But the FDA committee voted to not to test women to detect if they’re pregnant. They are telling doctors to be willfully blind when giving the drug,” Wright continued.

Americans United for Life and the American Association of Pro Life Obstetricians & Gynecologists told the FDA a study in England confirms the pro-life perspective that ulipristal acts as an abortion drug.

Anna Glasier, of NHS Lothian in Edinburgh, led a study of more than 5,500 women in the UK published online in The Lancet medical journal. It found fewer pregnancies among those women given the ellaOne drug within five days of intercourse.

And for women who took the drug between 3-5 days after having sex, only women taking the traditional morning after pill became pregnant. They’s because all of the women using ulipristal during that time period had abortions.

“AAPLOG has concluded from publicly available information that ulipristal acetate is an abortifacient of the same type as mifepristone (RU 486) and that its approval as an emergency contraceptive raises serious health and ethical issues,” the pro-life physicians group says. “Furthermore, ulipristal’s potential effects on women who used the drug off-label and upon ongoing pregnancies are essentially unexamined and untested.”

Pharmacists For Life International, in a statement to LifeNews.com, confirms the abortifacient nature of the Ella drug.

PFLI calls Ella a “chemical cousin analog of mifepristone,” the abortion drug more commonly known by its experimental name, RU 486. “Ulipristal acetate, according to its own developers, can kill embryos,” it confirms.

The organization said it “vehemently denounces and condemns the FDA for this inappropriate use of its drug regulatory power to destroy life rather than approve and regulate medicines which actually are life-saving and preserve health.” [related]

PFLI says it is concerned women will purchase the drug and stockpile it in large doses and sidestep the routine surgical or drug-induced abortion process with dangerous at-home abortions. It also worries the drug will be used by men who want to hide evidence of their crimes of sexual assault.

“This will lead to additional life-endangering problems for the targeted adolescent girls and women, as well as giving continued cover for sexual predators of underage girls and incestuous abusive relationships,” the group worries.

Watson is the exclusive marketer of ella in the U.S.