Almost eclipsed by the devastation of Hurricane Katrina to the Gulf Coast, was news of a different sort that surely will have a devastating effect of its own. The effect will be on the health of women and girls, particularly those with limited medical resources.
Just as catastrophic flooding took the highest toll on the poor, less informed and minority populations of Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana, political manipulation at the FDA will likely hit young girls, who have the least access to accurate information, the hardest.
When FDA Commissioner Lester Crawford last week postponed a promised decision to allow Plan B, the morning after pill, to be sold without a prescription, he set off a firestorm of protest within the agency and across the country. Already under fire for bungling the approval and labeling of dangerous prescription drugs, the FDA is fast losing all credibility in the scientific community.
FDA Biologist Susan F. Wood announced her resignation in protest, saying, “Scientific and clinical evidence, fully evaluated and recommended for approval by the profession staff here, has been overruled.”
Wood is not the first scientist to quit or be fired when their clinical findings were silenced, ignored or otherwise compromised by an agency increasingly under the influence of political ideology and government pressure. In some cases, to protect the interests of the pharmaceutical industry. In others, to protect the administration’s religious conservative base. Seldom to protect public health, and almost never to protect women’s reproductive health.
Predictably, at least one conservative antiabortion group, Concerned Women for America, issued a press release applauding Crawford’s decision not to make a decision, and Wood’s resignation. Wood, who is respected among her colleagues as not ideologically or politically motivated, has served two administrations, in several different jobs for 15 years.
Crawford’s stonewalling, procrastination, or whatever, is important because it’s just the latest political ploy to restrict women’s access to reproductive health. The pattern is unmistakable if you begin with Abstinence Only education for teens. How can a young girl make responsible decisions if she never learns the facts of conception and disease prevention. Children of poor and uneducated mothers have absolutely no way to learn to care for themselves if schools don’t teach all of it based on accurate science.
Why is it we have TV ads for Viagra and Cialis, but none for Plan B?
And then we have politically motivated decisions to allow pharmacists and drug stores to refuse to dispense contraceptives. How irresponsible is that?
Add to that increasing pressure from sexually explicit media promoting everything from cars to music, clothes to cosmetics. There’s always been cleverly applied pressure from boys, and some dirty old men, on young girls to have sex long before they’re ready and willing. In earlier times, that was easier to resist because movies and advertising were cleaner, more wholesome. Girls who fooled around were branded “fast” and “cheap,” so there was a stigma attached to early sexual behavior.
And now we have “alcopop.” Marketed specifically to teens. Well, what adult would consider diluting hard liquor with sticky sweet soda? The industry is pushing state legislation (AB 417) to reclassify Bacardi Silver, Smirnoff Ice, Mike’s Hard Lemonade and others as malt beverages. Currently, they’re taxed as distilled spirits, barred from TV ads and illegal to sell in thousands of retail outlets. But the law is routinely flouted through deceptive labeling as malt-based beverages, though they contain little if any beer.
TV and radio ads for the fruity, brightly colored drinks are aimed at young girls, who typically don’t acquire a taste for beer or hard liquor until much later. Surely this is good news to teen-aged boys, who have a long tradition of spiking fruit punch and soda to lower the defenses of their young dates.
What are we telling our children? We will give you no scientific knowledge or means to protect your health and your future, but it’s cool to drink something that effectively removes your will to “Just Say No.”
When will our politicians cut the mixed messages and give our kids what they need to be safe now and to become responsible adults tomorrow?