From Mrs M. Garner-Patel, MRPharmS, and Mr R. Garner-Patel, MRPharmS
SIR,-Many years ago, when Mr Darling was president, one of us put forward a local branch motion for the Society to change and allow us to take condoms from the bottom drawer and display the actual product and not just the notice "family planning requisites available on request".
We have come a long way since then.
Years later, women's groups persuaded the Labour government that it was cheaper to keep a woman on the "pill" for life free of charge, rather than have unwanted pregnancies.
Every child has the right to be wanted and welcomed. For the first time ever, women had control of their bodies, except when they were caught unawares and we now know that rape is more common than previously realised. That these women need immediate help is acceptable but the Society, once so coy and ambivalent towards sex and contraception, now wants to go too far the other way, in our opinion, by making emergency hormonal contraception a pharmacy medicine. That EHC is available at once and free is essential but it should be given only under the conditions that it can be used. I remember when a girl died after her lover filled her with quinine sulphate. The result: quinine was made a prescription only medicine. Triludan (terfenadine) was considered safe and we all know that story. Debendox was withdrawn after a certain baby was born in Los Angeles less than perfect and its condition was blamed, without substantial proof, on the Debendox its mother had consumed. The manufacturer withdrew the product, frightened of litigation. It is still available in the Indian subcontinent, a gynaecologist informs me, while our girls are sick needlessly.
We only need one question mark against EHC and those waiting in the wings will pounce and demand its withdrawal. Let us not give them an opportunity but adopt the pharmacist protocol, as practised successfully in certain areas, until the idea of a pharmacist prescribing category, as suggested by Hemant Patel, can come into play. This will ensure its safe, proper use with inbuilt safeguards so that it is not taken wrongly by a pregnant woman. It will be supplied free and immediately as needed. Let us not jump too high too quickly; the fall to earth could be disastrous for future womankind.
Marion Garner-Patel
Rajni Garner-Patel
Harrow, Middlesex