The FDA approves the first-ever non-prescription birth-control pill
If the decision was sobering, the concurring opinion was chilling. When the Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade, making states the new arbiters of abortion policy, Justice Clarence Thomas laid out a blueprint for what could come next. Harnessing the same legal logic that the court used to topple Roe, he called on his colleagues to do away with a trio of other precedents. Among them was Griswold v Connecticut, a 1965 case that established a married couple’s right to buy contraceptives without government restriction. Wide-eyed progressives braced for abortion battles to morph into a war over birth control.
Pro-lifers have been mulling going after the contraceptive pill, but an organised offensive to purge pharmacies of it has yet to materialise. Doing so will soon become harder. On July 13th the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Opill, the first-ever non-prescription birth-control pill. Come early 2024, women will be able to order Opill online or pick it up from drug stores without a doctor’s sign-off.
Liberals see this as an antidote to abortion restrictions. Making contraceptive pills more readily available should result in fewer unplanned pregnancies. But for this to be a practical option for women, Opill needs to be affordable. Perrigo, the company that makes it, has yet to disclose its price and private health insurers are not required to cover it (though an executive order issued in June suggests that President Joe Biden may try to change that).
2023-07-20 08:21:30
Article from www.economist.com
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