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Current Issues: January |
| Story 3b | |
| Such contempt for Parents and our Daughters |  |
| -safety concerns. | |
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I have grave concerns about the safety of the morning after pill. We
are told that it is 'perfectly safe' - but we have heard those weasel
words before.
How can anyone claim that the pill, which floods the female with a high dose of hormones, is safe? It has taken over 30 years for the problems associated with taking the contraceptive pill to emerge; a link with breast cancer, deep vein thrombosis, stoke and, indirectly, an alarming, increase in the sexually transmitted diseases that accompany unprotected sex. The morning after pill is equivalent to taking six contraceptive pills within 24 hours. And what of the side-effects and physical impact of the morning after pill? After taking it, a young woman will feel all the alarming and unpleasant effects of high and fluctuating hormone levels similar to early pregnancy - including morning sickness. Its supporters deny that the morning after pill constitutes early abortion - yet I believe that, like abortion, this pill will undoubtedly produce feelings of guilt and grief which may take time to surface in some young women. In the long term it may damage a women's feeling about men, her ability to love and make commitments, her self-worth. Making the morning after pill available without prescription also opens up the possibility of a women returning time and time again to a pharmacy to buy it after she has had unprotected sex. An over-the-counter sale will do nothing to address the underlying behaviour that leads to the woman needing emergency contraception in the first place. It gives her permission to continue in the same old irresponsible way. |