Pro-Life Group Challenges Federal Order to Sell Morning After Pill to Minor Girls

National   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Jun 29, 2009   |   9:00AM   |   WASHINGTON, DC

Pro-Life Group Challenges Federal Order to Sell Morning After Pill to Minor Girls

by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
June 29
, 2009

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — A pro-life legal group has filed the papers necessary for a pro-life organization to challenge a federal court order that required the Food and Drug Administration to allow the Plan B drug to be sold to minor girls. The Alliance Defense fund filed the papers to intervene in the case.

The group is acting on behalf of Concerned Women for America, the Christian Medical and Dental Association, and Christian Pharmacists Fellowship International.

The pro-life organizations contend that the order disregards parental rights and the safety of teenage girls.

Matt Bowman, a top attorney with ADF, talked with LifeNews.com about the challenge.

“The life and health of women, especially minors, is more important than the political agenda of pro-abortion activist groups," he said. "Minors are least of all in a position to make an informed decision about the life or death of a child, or even about their own safety. It is a lie that over-the-counter sales of this drug increase safety for women, including minors."

“The organizations that are seeking to intervene in this lawsuit represent thousands of medical personnel that will not only be affected by the court’s order but believe strongly that it will result in both parents and doctors being left out of the loop in a child’s care," Bowman explained.

"The order allows minors to bypass being seen by a doctor who can check for sexually transmitted diseases and other potentially serious medical conditions,” Bowman told LifeNews.com. “Our motion argues that the case should be dismissed because, under the law, the plaintiffs have not established sufficient reason that they can even ask for an order like this.”

In 2005, the pro-abortion Center for Reproductive Rights sued the Food and Drug Administration to force it to make the Plan B drug available over the counter.

The FDA agreed to make it available without a prescription to women 18 years of age or older. Unsatisfied, the CRR continued its lawsuit to force the FDA to make the drug available over the counter to girls aged 17.

In March, U.S. District Judge Edward R. Korman ordered the FDA to make the drug available to women as young as 17 within 30 days and to consider reversing its entire decision on selling the morning after pill to minors.

After the ruling, Wendy Wright, the president of Concerned Women for America, said the age restrictions need more enforcement, not less.

She also worries that a parent, older sibling or other relative or older friends could purchase the morning after pill for young teens, avoiding the requirement that they visit a doctor first before using the drug.

Wright said selling the morning after pill over the counter will make it easier for men who abuse young women to cover up their crimes.

"Any adult male who is having sex with a minor could walk into a pharmacy, buy the drug, and coax the girl into taking the pill," she said.

Wright also said that Planned Parenthood and abortion advocates were given certain restrictions by the FDA on the dangerous abortion drug RU 486, but that those haven’t been followed.

"Those restrictions have never been followed, women have died, yet no one has been punished nor the drug approval pulled,” said Wright.

Coincidentally, last week, the FDA approved the first generic version of the Plan B drug. The new generic of the so-called emergency contraceptive, which can cause abortions in limited circumstances, will be available in a 0.75 mg dosage.

The motion to intervene in Tummino v. Hamburg was filed Thursday with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York.

The morning after pill has been hailed by abortion advocates as a method of reducing abortions, but stats in the United States and elsewhere prove otherwise.

Related web sites:
Alliance Defense Fund – https://www.adfmedia.org

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