http://www.scotusblog.com/2013/05/judge-refuses-to-back-down-on-plan-b/ Judge refuses to back down on âPlan Bâ A federal judge in New York, in a blistering new denunciation of the Obama administration for what he said was playing politics with womenâs health, refused on Friday to lift his order that the Plan B emergency contraceptive be made available over the counter to women of all ages. He did give the government until Monday to start pursuing an appeal to the Second Circuit Court, but criticized that appeal as âfrivolous.â Senior U.S. District Judge Edward R. Korman of Brooklyn aimed most of his harsh critique at Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius, saying once again that she has abused her position and has frustrated womenâs access to Plan B even though the governmentâs own scientists say it is safe and effective in preventing pregnancy if taken soon after unprotected intercourse. He derided the arguments that the Justice Department plans to make in its appeal, saying that Sebelius herself has undercut those arguments. One argument, he said, was âsilly.â Korman went even further, accusing the administration of making a âsweetheart arrangementâ with the company that makes Plan B pills, negotiated one day before the government filed a formal notice that it would appeal, lowering the age of no-prescription action to the contraceptive from seventeen to fifteen. That deal was worked out, the judge asserted, to âprovide a sugarcoatingâ for the appeal the government was planning. The government waited as long as it could to respond to the judgeâs April 5 order requiring broader access to the drug, the judge said. Under that arrangement, Korman said, the Plan B maker â Teva Womenâs Health, Inc. â stands to gain a commercial advantage in selling the contraceptive, and women may find it harder to obtain the drug than they would have under the judgeâs order. Women will have to prove their age to a pharmacist or drugstore retail clerk to obtain Plan B, under the Food and Drug Administrationâs new arrangement. The Justice Department told the judge last week that it would challenge his order with two legal arguments: first, that the judge had no authority to order open access to the one-pill version of Plan B (known as Plan B One-Step) because the two-pill version was the only one at issue before him; and, second, that his order intruded on the FDAâs normal process of reviewing when to switch a prescription drug to over-the-counter status. Judge Korman sought to answer both arguments on the way toward suggesting that the appeal on those grounds would be âfrivolous.â He said the issue of which pill version was before him was no longer an issue, because Teva â instead of taking advantage of the wider access that the judge ordered â had made its new deal with the FDA to restrict access to any version to those fifteen years old and older. That issue, he said, is probably moot now. The judge rejected the argument that he was infringing on FDAâs expertise by issuing a specific order on over-the-counter access. That is precisely what the experts at FDA had wanted, before Secretary Sebelius overruled them, the judge said, so it was the Secretary who engaged in âundermining the publicâs confidence in the drug approval process.â Sebelius, he remarked sharply, made a âbad-faith, politically motivated decision,â and she âlacks any medical or scientific expertise.â By refusing to delay his own order as the government asked, the judge said, he was vindicating FDAâs expert judgment that Plan B should be available without a prescription and over the counter to women of all ages. To a separate argument by Justice Department lawyers that the judgeâs access order will only lead to public confusion about which contraceptive is available to women, Judge Korman replied that it is the new arrangement made with Teva that is going to result in confusion. The judge ticked off the multi-layered system of access that would result from the arrangement FDA has just made with Teva. It was ânonsensical,â the judge said, to work out that arrangement: first, women fifteen years of age or older will be allowed to buy the one-pill version, but only from a store with an on-site pharmacy and only if they can prove their age; second, other versions of the contraceptive with the same basic ingredient as Tevaâs Plan B will only be available from behind the counter and only for women over the age of seventeen who can prove their age with a government-issued ID; and, third, women who do not have a government ID or who are under the age of fifteen will not have any access to Tevaâs one-pill version and must get a prescription for a competing product, such as a generic version. This system is sure to cause confusion, much more than the judgeâs order on wide access, he said. While he denied the requested postponement of his order pending an appeal, he said he would not implement his order over the weekend, giving the Justice Department until noon Monday to file a request for a delay with the Second Circuit Court.
Didn't Obama say he was going to go along with the Morning After pill for 15 year olds? It's crazy but I'm sure that's what he said.
1 Star?? No Replies??? What is that disturbs ET's resident KKK descendants? The fact that Obama acted as you would have, or his kinship with you on this issue that it is rubbed in your face? Inquiring minds (look it up boys - and gayboys) want to know.