Pharmacists balk at Plan B proposal

Canada’s pharmacists are unhappy with a recommendation from an expert panel to give virtually anyone immediate access to an “emergency contraceptive” morning-after pill, the National Post reported last week.

An advisory committee to the federal government is proposing that a single dose of the pill known commercially as Plan B be sold off the shelf without women needing to first consult a pharmacist. As the newspaper noted, “The recommendation would mean people could buy emergency contraceptives much the way they can Aspirin or vitamins.”

“I’m not sure how comfortable the general public might be if a 14-year-old could just walk in, pick it up off the shelf, buy it, not have any interaction with anybody and come back a month later and do the same thing,” Canadian Pharmacists Association spokesperson Janet Cooper told the National Post. “That’s not in that girl’s best interests.”

If this proposal were to be accepted, said Cooper, Canada would have the most liberal policy on the ready availability of emergency contraceptives of any developed country.

Advocates of the morning-after pill contend that if a woman takes it within 72 hours of having had unprotected sex, she stands an 89 per cent chance of not becoming pregnant. But pro-lifers argue that since conception has already occurred, the pill causes a medically-induced abortion.

McGill University epidemiologist Dr. Abby Lippman, a leading member of the Canadian Women’s Health Network, welcomed the proposal. She said women needing to purchase Plan B would no longer be deterred by the requirement to discuss intimate details with a pharmacist. “I would just as soon that it be sold anywhere,” she said.

But Cooper counters this would deny women access to the kind of information and advice that only a pharmacist can provide. For example, she said that pharmacists have found that one in three women seeking to purchase the pill did not need it. Either their regular birth control was sufficient protection, or they were too late for it to work.

Canadian women have been able to purchase Plan B without a doctor’s prescription for three years now.