There's apparently hell to pay when you point out that there's no scientific or medical reason to deny women over-the-counter access to emergency contraception. Although the Bush administration and Congress requested and allocated a full $4 million in funding for the Office of Women's Health, the FDA plans to withhold more than a quarter of that money -- $1.2 million.
Martha R. Nolan, a vice president at the Society for Women's Health Research, a Washington advocacy group, said that big budget bites in Washington are often the beginning of the end and that she worries that this is retribution for the Plan B controversy."We fear this is the first step toward eliminating the Office of Women's Health," Nolan said. "We must not allow this office to be eliminated or reduced to an empty shell that has no program funding."
But if the funding cut becomes official, the office is going to be in a bind NOW, not just in the future. They've already spent or allocated the remaining portion of their budget for this fiscal year, which means that program operations will come to a grinding halt if they don't receive the additional $1.2 million they were counting on. That'll teach them to stand up to the FDA.
0 TrackBacks
Listed below are links to blogs that reference this entry: Plan B-acklash.
TrackBack URL for this entry: http://www.feministing.com/cgi-bin/movabletype/mt-tb.fcgi/4853
Weekly Feministing Newsletter
Feministing RSS Feed
Is this the whole No Child Left Behind Act?
Because one would think they would focus on the children already born humans than an egg that hasn't dropped yet. *that joke only works if my understanding of EC is correct.
You knew the Bush Administration would respond to Plan B OTC eventually...
I'd like to propose the unofficial slogan of the Admin: "Bush and Friends - screwing women quietly from behind since 2001."
Honest to god, if I wasn't such a wimp about the cold I'd just move to Canada. I like how they're doing things up there.
I always thought plan B would be embraced by the pro-life side. It prevents pregnancy from happening but if you're already pregnant, it won't do anything. It seems like a great compromise for people who are morally opposed to abortion. But again, there must be some flaw in my thinking, because I'm continually proven wrong on this point. Guess I'd better head down to PP and buy some Plan B to hold me over until the next presidential term.
Just when I thought I couldn't hate Bush anymore than I have since like 1999 or so...
Genny, from my understanding, some "pro-lifers" consider teh spermy-in-the-eggy a life already, even if it's not attached to the uterus so that it can grow. But in Bush's case I think he just wants to see HOW many ways he can be a pain in my liberal ass.
...just because i feel like using my calculator, the $1.2 million they're planning to withold would be... roughly 1/100th of 1% of the $10 billion in cash that's gone missing in Iraq. Good to see priorities are in order.