Please consider offering your personal or organizational endorsement to this initiative!

Dear friends

A coalition of national organizations, spearheaded by Women and Health Protection and the Canadian Women's Health Network, has been working for some time to increase access to Emergency Contraception (ECP) for women and girls in Canada.

You may recall that non-prescription status was granted to Plan B in 2005, making it no longer a drug requiring a prescription from a physician. It became a "Schedule II" drug, available behind the counter in a pharmacy with access controlled by pharmacists.

You may also recall that In Ontario and Manitoba in the past 3 months, there has been attention to the fact that some pharmacists are requiring that women seeking Plan B provide private and confidential information to the pharmacist before they can receive the product. This has been duly challenged by privacy authorities in both provinces. While we strongly support a role for pharmacists in consumer education, we do not support this as a mandatory activity.

A consortium of national groups who have been working on access issues to ECP have prepared a brief to the National Drug Scheduling Advisory Committee (NDSAC) and the relevant provinces to have the status of Plan B (emergency contraception) moved off-schedule, i.e. with no pharmacist intervention and sold at any retail outlet. We intend to submit our brief and a cover letter to the National Association of Pharmacy Regulatory Authorities (NAPRA) asking that they - in the name of public interest - put this issue on the agenda of a forthcoming meeting of NDSAC in March so that the scheduling terms might be reviewed and changed, making it available more broadly. Our brief argues that there is sufficient safety evidence for moving this drug to an off-schedule status, as has been done in other jurisdictions internationally.

We have prepared a backgrounder about the issue - in English and French - which is available on line -
at http://www.whp-apsf.ca/pdf/ECbackgrounderEN.pdf. (PDF file requires Adobe Acrobat Reader)

If you would like to see a copy of our brief, let us know (whp-apsf@web.ca) and we will forward it to you. The brief will be posted on-line once we have submitted it to NDSAC.

We already have about 15 organizations and individuals endorsing this initiative and would like you to help if you can. If you would like to add your name personally - or that of your organization - to the list of endorsers,

PLEASE RESPOND to whp-apsf@web.ca by Monday February 20. Names of organizations usually carry more weight, but names of individuals are also welcome. These names will be listed in our brief to NDSAC.

BOTTOM LINE:

• Women and girls need better access to emergency contraception in Canada.
• We have an opportunity to have the authority that regulates this (NDSAC) review our proposal for change to off-schedule status.
• We need your support for the strongest presentation possible.

Thanks for considering this.

Anne Rochon Ford
(for Women and Health Protection)

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