AARRGGHHH. Mr. B. sent me this video clip from The View, in which Barbara Walters tells half the women in America that Plan B works by preventing implantation. WHICH IS NOT TRUE. Plan B works by preventing ovulation. Sperm hangs out in your reproductive tract for a while, waiting for an egg. If you ovulate while the sperm is still alive, you get pregnant. If you can prevent ovulation, e.g., with Plan B, then you prevent pregnancy.

The evidence shows ECPs work by preventing ovulation. There is no direct evidence they prevent fertilization. There's also no direct evidence they prevent implantation in humans.

And then the ladies at the View get into a huge argument about right to life and blah blah, and completely fail to talk about whether or not Plan B is going to be available over the counter or not.

Barbara Walters needs to be bombarded with letters setting her straight (link on the left). This kind of misinformation, in that kind of forum, is precisely the kind of shit that helps perpetuate crap like emergency rooms not providing e.c. to rape victims, pharmacists refusing to fill prescriptions, and the rest of this tragically effective politcally-motivated movement to deny women basic reproductive services.

If I get a t-shirt made up that says "Plan B is not abortion. Ask me why," would you guys buy it? By noemail@noemail.org (bitchphd). [Bitch. Ph.D.]

It is so infuriating to see media people get the science so wrong, and in a fashion that mkaes it harder, not easier to explain to people. To paraphrase Twain (I think) a lie has traveled halfway around the world before truth has tied its shoelaces.   6:22:43 PM