Get Outta My Chair!

It was announced earlier this week that the Morning After Pill, also known as Plan B, will be available over the counter for purchase. The Bush Administration had banned this from happening previously, but with Bush out of office a court overturned the previous decisions about the product.

The FDA supports the sale of the drug over the counter and without a prescription. In fact, they support it enough to allow it to be sold to 17 year olds, as well as those 18 and older. Naturally, this is something that has many people outraged.

If you are unfamiliar with Plan B, it is the Morning After Pill. Essentially it is an amped up birth control pill that floods your system in order to stop ovulation and attempt to prevent any fertilized eggs from attaching to the uterus. According to reports, if taken within 72 hours there is about a 90% success rate and the woman using it will not get pregnant.

Looking at this logically, there are a million reasons to allow this to 17 year olds. In all honesty it should be allowed to 15 and 16 year olds, too. In a perfect world people of all ages would know better than to have unprotected sex, but this is reality and people (especially teenagers) do things without thinking.

It is unreasonable to assume that a teenager, a person generally incapable of taking care of themselves should have to deal with the demands of parenthood when they are not even grown adults. One single act of sex alienates them from everything they know and are comfortable with. They face humiliation and who knows what else when their parents find out. Many girls end up alone and unsure of how to face the future.

The only person that should be able to judge whether a person is ready to be a parent or not is the person in question. Allowing a 17 year old to purchase this on their own gives them the freedom to make the decision to protect themselves, as best they can. It also ensures, or it should, that these kids will think a lot harder about their choices the next time an opportunity arises for them to have sex.

Some parents are furious, but kids are going to do what they want. There are enough unwanted and neglected babies in this world. If a girl takes this medication knowing that she is not ready for motherhood that is a good thing. I wish more people would have the common sense to use this medication or to give their children up for adoption if they are unwilling or unable to care for them.

I suppose you can’t please everyone, but what does the anti-abortion crowd want? This is a safe way for a girl to take care of her body, whether she is pregnant or not. Having the baby, if there even is one, and giving it up is much harder for some women. There are hundreds of thousands of children in the U.S. foster care system that have not been (and probably won’t be) adopted. Things like this often put people off, too.

While I don’t think I could have an abortion personally I believe it’s up to a woman to decide because she knows her body better than anyone else. That being said, I don’t see Plan B like I do an abortion. With an abortion you know that there is a baby inside of you. With Plan B, there is no for sure indicator that the woman is even pregnant. There is a possibility that she is and a certainty that she does not want to be. That’s hardly abortion.

What do you think? Should teenagers be allowed to take Plan B without a prescription or parental consent? Let us know your thoughts.

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