News

By Gudrun Schultz

POMONA, New York, June 22, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Emergency contraception sales in Canada have almost doubled since Health Canada last year made prescriptions unnecessary for the abortifacient drug Plan B. Researchers are speculating that at least part of the increase is due to American women purchasing the medication over the border or on the Internet, the Boston Globe reported yesterday.

The Canadian manufacturer of Plan B, Duramed Pharmaceuticals Inc., is now selling 41,000 pills per month in Canadian pharmacies compared to about 23,000 per month in 2005, according to the Internet retail company DoctorSolve Healthcare Solutions. Duramed is a subsidiary of U.S.-based Barr Pharmaceuticals Inc., which confirmed the accuracy of the sales trend, according to the Globe.

Judith Soon, a Canadian researcher with the University of British Columbia, has been tracking the economic progression of emergency contraceptive use in Canada.

“In Canada, women do not require a Plan B prescription from a physician to obtain treatment. It can be obtained directly upon request from a trained pharmacist,” Soon told the Globe. “As many states border on Canadian provinces, it is likely that women obtain Plan B treatments by crossing the border or through Internet pharmacies. It is not possible to quantify this number.”

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is expected to decide this summer on whether to release Plan B as a non-prescription drug in the U.S.

  Barr Pharmaceuticals’ first application to have the drug approved for over-the-counter sales was rejected by the FDAÂover concernsÂabout the purchase of the drug by young girls. A second application that would limit sales of the drug to girls older than 15 years of age has been under review since last summer.

The drug is a concentrated dose of hormones, double the strength of regular birth control pills, which acts eitherÂto prevent fertilization of the egg within the first 72 hours after unprotected sex, or to prevent an already-conceived child from implanting in the womb, resulting in the death of the child.

Dr. Will Johnston, President of Canadian Physicians for Life, told LifeSiteNews last year that the morning-after pill (Plan B) is “consistently mislabelled” with the “absurd suggestion” that the pill is a contraceptive and not an abortifacient.

“The common description of the MAP as emergency contraception fails to accurately describe its possible abortifacient action and is misleading the public,” Dr. Johnston said.

  See related LifeSiteNews coverage:

Abortion-Causing Morning-After Pill Available Over the Counter in Canada by Spring
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/apr/05040503.html

Pharmacists Rightly Concerned about Women’s Health and Plan B
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/dec/05120208.html

FDA Delays Decision on Abortifacient Morning-After Pill Approval
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/aug/05082905.html