Agency Rejects Bid to Ban Pill

Health officials on Friday denied San Bernardino County’s bid to ban the morning-after contraceptive pill in public clinics, setting the stage for a highly anticipated test of the Bush administration’s stance on family planning.

In a letter to the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors, the California Family Health Council--a nonprofit group that distributes federal family-planning money in the state--said the county’s request “does not reflect any understanding of the purpose, mechanisms or safety of hormonal emergency contraception.”

The decision formalizes a tentative ruling last month.

County Supervisor Bill Postmus, an outspoken social conservative who represents San Bernardino’s high desert and has led the charge to ban the pill, dismissed the Health Council as “left-leaning,” and pledged to appeal the decision to the Bush administration.

San Bernardino County sought to ban the pills, which some see as a form of abortion, in county-run health clinics out of concern that they could be given to minors.

The county needs permission to prohibit the pills because it receives federal funding for family planning--and, by law, morning-after pills must be made available at public clinics that receive that money.

But the Family Health Council suggested such a step would violate state and federal law and said the county’s arguments for banning the pill are misguided.

For example, the county contended that giving women heavy doses of estrogen is risky. But the morning-after pills most commonly used contain no estrogen, said Anita Nelson, a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the Harbor UCLA Medical Center and a medical advisor to the Health Council.

Unlike the more controversial RU-486, which expels a fetus, morning-after pills are heavy doses of birth control drugs that typically prevent conception by blocking implantation of a fertilized egg.

The medical community considers the morning-after pill an important way to reduce unplanned pregnancies. Supporters say the pill will prevent 1.7 million pregnancies this year, and, subsequently, 800,000 abortions.

County health records show that the vast majority of pills given out last year were not given to teens but to adult women without insurance or access to family-planning counseling.

“We have 25 years of evidence showing how strong and effective this is,” Nelson said. “The thought that this would not be made available to poor women in San Bernardino County is horrifying.”

The county’s request will be forwarded to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Margie Fites Seigle, the Health Council’s chief executive, said she does not believe there will be a different result there.

“I think that the medical and the scientific information is so clear and so solid,” she said. “I am very comfortable with the rationale of our response and believe it’s correct.”

Still, abortion foes and other supporters of the county’s request held out hope Friday that the Bush administration would step in. One of the president’s first moves upon taking office was to ban federal funding of overseas family planning groups that promote or perform abortions. Bush is also a strong proponent of the notion of local government control.

Postmus said Friday’s decision was hardly a surprise, and said he expects the final decision will be made by Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson.

“We’ll send this to the proper channels,” he said. “I think all sides should not have any problem with having this go to the administration and let them make a decision.”

But Health and Human Services officials cast doubt Friday on the county’s chances of success. Campbell Garnett, an HHS spokesman in Washington, said the department has not been involved so far, and he questioned whether the county could legally appeal the decision to the Bush administration.

And Ronald Banks, regional health administrator for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in San Francisco, where an appeal would likely go next, said he doubts that the county will be able to meet the government’s standard of “exceptional circumstances” needed for a waiver.

“This would make women in San Bernardino County the only women in California to have this tool taken away from them. I think that would certainly contravene the intent of Congress.”