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LIMA, October 12, 2004 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Peruvian health minister, Pilar Mazzetti is moving forward with her scheme to introduce the abortifacient morning after pill for distribution in public health clinics despite the constitution’s protection of human life from conception onwards. She expects to have the drug available by January. Mazzetti is facing opposition from the public and a group of legislators who want to see her prosecuted for attempting to promote abortion.

Mazzetti claimed to have scientific evidence that the morning after pill does not prevent implantation and is therefore not abortifacient. After a report from the United States FDA showed that the morning after pill does prevent implantation, she claimed to have ‘more up to date’ evidence that showed it did not. Later it was shown that her study was provided by Peruvian gynecologist Luis Tavara, working for the UN Population Fund and was two years older than the FDA report. Mazzetti was then pressured to delay the implementation of her plan.

Today she announced to reporters that she is determined to move forward. “The decision is made and there is no turning back,” she said. “This is not based on personal beliefs, but in technical and scientific studies that show the pill is not abortive.” Ironically, a BBC report quoting Mazzetti’s goes on to state in the next line that the pill works by preventing implantation of the “fertilized egg” after conception.  In June of this year, Carlos Polo, writing for the Population Research Institute from Lima, said that the simultaneous emergence of the morning after pill in Latin American countries where abortion is supposed to be outlawed is no coincidence. The World Health Organization is working with USAID, International Planned Parenthood and other population control organizations to introduce the drug to Peru and a number of other predominantly Catholic South and Central American Countries.  In August 2003, 6000 Peruvians marched demanding that President Alejandro Toledo not only overrule Mazzetti’s project but also fire her for lying about the non-abortifacient effect of the drug. A Peruvian research physician and pro-life leader, Dr. Raúl Cantella, said “Mazzetti expresses perfectly the ‘baby steps’ abortion promoters are taking in the region to legalize abortion.”  Previous LifeSiteNews.com coverage:  World Health Organization Campaigning with False Science to open Peru to Abortifacients https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2004/sep/04090904.html Catholic World News article:  https://www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=32621   ph