i'm a pretty fit & trim man...suppose i don't want to pay for your diabetes? Shouldn;t a medical condition be a medical condition? I'll take a doctor's definition over an insurance company board's.
So impotence and diabetes are on the same level of health concern? Holler at me when your penis becomes so flaccid it has to be amputated or you'll die.
It's really not worth commenting on. They have nothing to gain and it is just an opportunistic advantage-taking ploy by the Dems. Yes, I read somewhere that if his show could be characterized as political rather than entertainment, he could be held more liable...
Fight Birth-Control Battle Over the Counter By Virginia Postrel Mar 8, 2012 6:10 PM CT http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-...e-counter-commentary-by-virginia-postrel.html Anyone -- a local teenager, a traveling businessman, a married mother of four, an illegal immigrant, even a student at a Jesuit university -- can walk into my neighborhood CVS any time, day or night, and, for less than $30, buy a 36-count “value pack” of Trojan condoms. That’s enough to last most Americans at least three months, according to Kinsey Institute surveys. If you want more, you can buy out the store’s entire stock. There’s no limit, and you don’t need to see a doctor for permission and a prescription. Contrary to widespread belief, there’s no good reason that oral contraceptives -- a far more effective form of birth control -- can’t be equally convenient. True, making the pill available over the counter could reduce the amount of outrage and invective available for entertaining radio audiences, spurring political fundraising and otherwise amusing the American public. But the medical risks are quite low. Partly because birth-control pills are available only by prescription, people tend to think they’re more dangerous and less well understood than they actually are. In fact, “more is known about the safety of oral contraceptives than has been known about any other drug in the history of medicine,” declared an editorial in the American Journal of Public Health back in 1993. That editorial accompanied an article arguing for over-the-counter sales. Safer Than Ever Unlike most medications, the article noted, birth-control pills require no medical diagnosis: “A woman herself determines her need for oral contraception; she assesses her own risk of pregnancy ... and the costs and benefits of both pregnancy and alternative contraceptions.” Nearly two decades later, birth- control pills look even safer than they did then, and recent research indicates that women are both able and eager to manage their own purchase decisions. Requiring a prescription “acts more as a barrier to access rather than providing medically necessary supervision,” argues Daniel Grossman of Ibis Reproductive Health, a research and advocacy group based in Massachusetts, in an article published in September in Expert Review of Obstetrics & Gynecology. Birth-control pills can have side effects, of course, but so can such over-the-counter drugs as antihistamines, ibuprofen or the Aleve that once turned me into a scary, hive-covered monster. That’s why even the most common over-the-counter drugs, including aspirin, carry warning labels. Most women aren’t at risk from oral contraceptives, however, just as most patients aren’t at risk from aspirin or Benadryl, and studies suggest that a patient checklist can catch most potential problems. To further increase safety, over-the-counter sales could start with a progestin-only formulation, sometimes called the “minipill,” rather than the more-common combinations of progestin and estrogen. (Although we casually refer to “The Pill,” oral contraceptives actually come in about 100 formulations.) Progestin-only pills, or POPs, have fewer contraindications. Unlike combination pills, they’re OK for women with hypertension, for instance, or smokers over the age of 35. The main dangers are fairly rare conditions such as breast cancer or current liver disease. “Not only are POP contraindications rare, but women appear to be able to accurately identify them using a simple checklist without the aid of a clinician,” declares an article forthcoming in the journal Contraception. Doctors’ Financial Interest Aside from safety, the biggest argument for keeping birth- control pills prescription-only is, to put it bluntly, extortion. The current arrangement forces women to go to the doctor at least once a year, usually submitting to a pelvic exam, if they want this extremely reliable form of contraception. That demand may suit doctors’ paternalist instincts and financial interests, but it doesn’t serve patients’ needs. As the 1993 article’s authors noted, the exam requirement “assumes that it would be worse for a woman’s health to miss out on routine care than it would be to miss out on taking oral contraceptives.” Going to the doctor is costly in time, money and sometimes in dignity. Not surprisingly, the prescription requirement deters use of oral contraceptives. In a 2004 phone survey, 68 percent of American women said they would start the pill or another form of hormonal birth control, such as the patch, if they could buy it in a pharmacy with screening by a pharmacist instead of getting a doctor’s prescription. Two-thirds of blacks and slightly more than half of whites and Latinas surveyed said they chose their current, less-effective method of birth control because it didn’t require a prescription. Right now, the American women who have the most choice are those who live near the border with Mexico, where pharmacies sell oral contraceptives without a prescription, generally for about $5 for a one-month supply. A group of researchers including Grossman have conducted extensive interviews with more than 1,000 women who live in El Paso, Texas. Roughly half the women get birth-control pills from local clinics, often free, while the other half go across the border to pharmacies in Ciudad Juarez. The researchers find, not surprisingly, that those who cross the border have more ties to Mexico; 77 percent were born there, compared with 60 percent of clinic users. But there are also differences in priorities. “Among pharmacy users, very large percentages noted both not having to go to a doctor to get a prescription and being able to send a friend or relative to pick up their pills as advantages of Mexican pharmacies,” the researchers write in a June 2010 article in the American Journal of Public Health. Clinic users, on the other hand, cite low cost and the availability of other health services. Convenient and Reasonable In addition, the authors note, for many clinic users crossing the border to buy contraceptives “was neither convenient nor free of risk; more than half expressed a fear of being stopped by US customs upon their return.” Nonetheless, Grossman notes in an e-mail, the research “showed that US resident women are interested in OTC access when it’s convenient and available at a reasonable price.” One result from the El Paso study surprised researchers. “Women who got the pill in clinics were significantly more likely to stop using it during the study -- even though they still didn’t want to get pregnant,” Grossman says. That’s a big deal. In fact, he says, “my hope was that we would show that continuation was no worse for the OTC group, but in fact we showed it was better.” This suggests that having to see a doctor to get a prescription renewed really does drive women away from oral contraceptives. “People rarely tell you, ‘I ran out and I was too lazy to get my prescription renewed,’” says Joseph Potter, a University of Texas demographer who worked on the El Paso research. “They say they quit because of side effects.” But the problem isn’t really laziness or, for that matter, out-of- pocket expense. It’s all the things that get in the way. Potter recalls an airplane conversation with a department-store executive who said that poor women weren’t the only ones to quit the pill because they couldn’t get to a doctor. She’d done the same thing, because she was busy. The real question now isn’t whether allowing over-the- counter sales would benefit women and prevent unwanted pregnancies -- the evidence is overwhelming that it would -- but whether any pharmaceutical maker wants to change the status quo. For a pill already approved by the Food and Drug Administration for prescription sales, getting over-the-counter approval would require an estimated $10 million to pay for new studies. And, of course, there would be huge marketing costs to establish the new brand. The company best positioned to make the switch is probably Johnson & Johnson. (JNJ) Its McNeil Consumer Healthcare division, most famous for Tylenol, has lots of experience marketing formerly prescription-only products, including Nicorette, Motrin and Pepcid. Most important, its drug Ortho Micronor is one of the few progestin-only pills already registered with the FDA. (Minipills are more common in Europe, but moving one of those drugs to the U.S. would require millions more in regulatory expenses just to get approval for prescription sales.) Will J&J or another company take a chance on creating the Advil of oral contraceptives -- making a prescription product a touchstone consumer brand? Are there public policy changes that could encourage the switch? If you’re actually interested in preventing unwanted pregnancies rather than merely scoring political points, these are the questions you should be asking.
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An Australian POV: http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/293094/fluke-charade-mark-steyn?pg=1 THIS IS FUNNY "I’m writing this from Australia, so, if I’m not quite up to speed on recent events in the United States, bear with me — the telegraph updates are a bit slow here in the bush. As I understand it, Sandra Fluke is a young coed who attends Georgetown Law, and recently testified before Congress. Oh, wait, no. Update: It wasn’t a congressional hearing; the Democrats just got it up to look like one, like summer stock, with Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid doing the show right here in the barn, and providing a cardboard set for the world premiere of Miss Fluke Goes to Washington, with full supporting cast led by Chuck Schumer strolling in through the French windows in tennis whites and drawling, “Anyone for bull****?” Oh, and the “young coed” turns out to be 30, which is what less evolved cultures refer to as early middle age. She’s a couple of years younger than Mozart was at the time he croaked, but, if the Dems are to be believed, the plucky little Grade 24 schoolgirl has already made an even greater contribution to humanity. She’s had the courage to stand up in public and demand that someone else (and this is where one is obliged to tiptoe cautiously, lest offense is given to gallant defenders of the good name of American maidenhood such as the many prestigious soon-to-be-former sponsors of this column who’ve booked Bill Maher for their corporate retreat with his amusing “Sarah Palin is a c***” routine . . . ) Where was I? Oh, yes. The brave middle-aged schoolgirl had the courage to stand up in public and demand that someone else pay for her sex life. Well, as noted above, she’s attending Georgetown, a nominally Catholic seat of learning, so how expensive can that be? Alas, Georgetown is so nominally Catholic that the cost of her sex life runs to three grand — and, according to the star witness, 40 percent of female students “struggle financially” because of the heavy burden of maintaining a respectable level of premarital sex at a Jesuit institution. As I said, I’m on the other side of the planet, so maybe I’m not getting this. But I’d say the core issue here is not religious liberty — which in these Godless times the careless swing voter now understands as a code phrase meaning that uptight Republicans who can’t get any action want to stop you getting any, too. Nor is the core issue liberty in its more basic sense — although it would certainly surprise America’s founders that their republic of limited government is now the first nation in the developed world to compel private employers to fully fund the sex lives of their employees. Nor is it even the distinctively American wrinkle the Republic of Paperwork has given to governmentalized health care, under which the “right to privacy” the Supreme Court claimed to have discovered in Griswold v. Connecticut and Roe v. Wade will now lead to thousands and thousands of self-insuring employers keeping computer records of the morning-after pills and herpes medication racked up by Miss Jones on reception. Nor is the issue that America has 30-year-old schoolkids — or even 30-year-old schoolkids who expect someone else to pick up the tab for their extracurricular activities, rather than doing a paper route and a bit of yard work to save up for their first IUD, as we did back in my day. After all, the human right to government-mandated free contraception is as American as apple pie and far healthier for you. In my most recent book, I quote one of Sandra Fluke’s fellow geriatrics gamboling in the groves of academe and complaining to the Washington Post about the quality of free condoms therein: “If people get what they don’t want, they are just going to trash them,” said T Squalls, 30, who attends the University of the District of Columbia. “So why not spend a few extra dollars and get what people want?” All of us are born with the unalienable right to life, liberty, and a lifetime supply of premium ribbed silky-smooth ultrasensitive spermicidal lubricant condoms. No taxation without rubberization, as the Minutemen said. The shot heard round the world, and all that."
How is this funny? This is what Limbaugh said without calling her a slut and a w****. You're so out there giddy you've lost any semblance of common sense.
Have you watched her testimony? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlRC0nsjtKQ She claims to speak on behalf of the Georgetown Law Students for Reproductive Justice. The friend with polycystic ovarian syndrome is but one story. Others are not nearly so dramatic. Bottomline seems to be that they want to force the institution to change to suit their demands.
My favorite was the Grade 24 schoolgirl.... What on earth makes her think that she can go to a Catholic university and demand of them Birth Control?
Sure, not nearly so, just mundane nuisances like endometriosis and rape. The lie that continues to be told by reprehensible regressives and neo-confederates is that she is demanding free contraception, that she insists 'that someone else pay for her sex life.' This is a lie. Do not expect to continue to profess this nonsense without being challenged and corrected.
Liberal statists calling on the government power to remove / arrest Limbaugh: http://www.cnn.com/2012/03/10/opinion/fonda-morgan-steinem-limbaugh/index.html FCC should clear Limbaugh from airwaves If Clear Channel won't clean up its airways, then surely it's time for the public to ask the FCC a basic question: Are the stations carrying Limbaugh's show in fact using their licenses "in the public interest?" Spectrum is a scarce government resource. Radio broadcasters are obligated to act in the public interest and serve their respective communities of license. In keeping with this obligation, individual radio listeners may complain to the FCC that Limbaugh's radio station (and those syndicating his show) are not acting in the public interest or serving their respective communities of license by permitting such dehumanizing speech. The FCC takes such complaints into consideration when stations file for license renewal. For local listeners near a station that carries Limbaugh's show, there is plenty of evidence to bring to the FCC that their station isn't carrying out its public interest obligation. Complaints can be registered under the broadcast category of the FCC website: http://www.fcc.gov/complaints -------------------------------------------------------------------- Gloria Allred seeks Rush Limbaugh prosecution http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0312/73829.html Rush Limbaugh has drawn the ire of celebrity lawyer Gloria Allred, who sent a letter to the Palm Beach County state attorney requesting an investigation into whether the popular radio host should be prosecuted for calling a law student a “slut” and “prostitute” last week. “Mr. Limbaugh targeted his attack on a young law student who was simply exercising her free speech and her right to testify before congress on a very important issue to millions of American women and he vilified her. He defamed her and engaged in unwarranted, tasteless and exceptionally damaging attacks on her,” Allred told POLITICO Friday afternoon. “He needs to face the consequences of his conduct in every way that is meaningful.”
<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/MqHxrVDY8Cg" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> Limbaugh circa the 1800s. What travails! Celebrity lawyers pursuing you, oh me oh my.
