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Saturday, September 06, 2003The Food and Drug Administration yesterday approved a new type of birth control pill that enables women to skip their monthly menstrual cycle for about three months. It contains estrogen and progesterone, the same hormones that are in birth control pills now, but they’re taken for much longer periods of time: ....each packet contains 84 hormone pills instead of 21, followed by seven placebo pills, so the reproductive process is suppressed for three months instead of three weeks. Of course, a lot of women are going to love dispensing with their periods, although not all: ...In tests, Seasonale won praise from women who suffer from intense problems associated with their periods. But Seasonale also sparked debate over what is considered "natural," whether it is wise to manipulate a woman's reproductive cycle with hormones for long periods of time and whether Seasonale is a manifestation of societal biases against menstruation. Well, it’s easy - and justified - to be biased against menstruation, but still others see a plot by population control activists: In keeping with this mission, the Population Council is a leader in the development of new contraceptives. The notion that long-term contraceptive regimens should be used to stifle menstruation was originally the brainchild of Population Council researchers; in particular, former council vice president and endocrinologist Sheldon J. Segal, who co-authored the book, Is Menstruation Obsolete? with Elismar Coutinho, a Brazilian gynecologist. Segal is also a member of a council division known as the International Committee for Contraceptive Research. Almost all of the latest propaganda used to promote Seasonale comes directly from Segal and Coutinho’s book. The Population Council further pushes the concept through a plethora of recent pro-Seasonale articles from other council members, such as “reproductive health” researcher Charlotte Ellertson and Sarah L. Thompson, both quoted earlier in this article. Quotes from these “authorities” have helped clinch public support of Seasonale and everything it stands for. Barr and friends hope to see FDA approval of Seasonale within the year; their expectation is not far-fetched. It seems that the population control agenda is more important than the fact that long-term effects of a constant influx of synthetic hormones has barely been studied, much less proven to be safe and natural. Interestingly, they got their approval not within a year, but within a month. And this would be the same FDA panel that has several members who were much maligned by the press and reproductive rights activists as being too pro-life. Looks like their fears were unfounded. Ideology aside, however, there is reason to approach this new birth control pill with caution. Current conventional medical wisdom has it that it’s just not healthy to supress menstruation. The constant exposure to estrogen and progesterone causes the lining of the uterus to remain in its thickest phase (see days 15-28 on this illustration), causing a condition called endometrial hyperplasia. Endometrial hyperplasia, while usually benign, can increase the risk of uterine cancer. While it’s true that women who take birth control pills have a lower incidence of endometrial cancer, they also have regular periods - at least with current birth control pills. The pharmaceutical company says that Seasonale is as safe as other birth control pills, but their Phase III clinical trial only lasted one year, and most women take contraceptives for around fifteen to twenty years. No one knows what the long term consequences of suppressing menstruation will be. And I must say, it is odd that this is touted as a healthy intervention while estrogen and progesterone in the form of hormone replacement therapy is so widely disparaged. Fools rush in. posted by Sydney on 9/06/2003 05:06:00 PM 0 comments 0 Comments: |
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