FDA whistleblower Susan Wood, with whom I've appeared publicly in the past, has a nice op-ed in the Post today about her former agency's continuing intransigence on the issue of Plan B contraception. I was a tad disappointed, though, by Wood's agnosticism about what's causing the continual delays in approving a safe, effective drug that would actually reduce the number of abortions if made widely available. Wood concludes her piece as follows:
It's been nearly three years since the first application came in to make Plan B emergency contraception available over the counter, so that women, including rape victims, could have a second chance to prevent an unintended pregnancy and the need for an abortion. How many chances have we missed? I still can't explain what is going on here, and why women 17 and older are still denied this product in a timely way. When did adult access to contraception become controversial? And why have we allowed it to happen?
Susan Wood, meet the Religious Right, which has lots of influence over this administration and doesn't care one whit for your impeccable logic. For religious conservatives, emergency contraception equals promiscuity, and promiscuity equals immorality. Period. Coming from this perspective, Christian conservatives are perfectly willing to upend science and the administrative process in order to block access to drugs that they view as contributing to increasing sexual behavior among teens (despite the total lack of data that the drugs actually have this effect). And this administration is perfectly willing to go along. Susan Wood, please also meet Cristina Page, who has done a great job delving into the Christian Right's psyche on this matter. Here's how I've summarized Page's views:
Conservative Christians are cultural traditionalists who are trying to impose a larger moral vision upon society. They're also complete absolutists in their thinking. This leads them to oppose contraception out of the fear that it promotes promiscuity even though wider availability of contraception would nevertheless also decrease the number of abortions.
Precisely. Now, don't get me wrong: Scientist whistleblowers like Susan Wood are invaluable. They peel back the curtain and let us know what's really going on in this administration. Without them we would be lost. But at the same time, I think there's too much shying away from stating plainly what should be obvious. When science is being misused in this administration, the distortions tend to serve some particular interest group's agenda. When concerning ourselves with the so-called "politicization of science," we thus cannot escape political explanations for why it may be happening.
