Kathleen Sebelius

Yesterday I had the pleasure of gathering with several women who shared very personal stories about how they have struggled in our current health care system. I also heard a lot about how the new health care law is helping women in so many important ways.

Robyn, a mother of three shared her story about her son, Jax—a delightful cutie who was possibly the best behaved child I have ever seen (not a peep in over an hour!)—who was diagnosed with a genetic disorder. Jax would have likely reached a lifetime limit on health coverage but, thanks to the health care law, Robyn does not have to worry about that. Instead of constantly worrying about her son’s coverage and her family’s financial stability, she can instead enjoy her three beautiful children and continue working at a job she loves. Read more »

Because of you, many women will not lose access to no-cost birth control under the health care law.

For months now, we've been updating you on a new "interim" rule that would provide women across the country access to birth control with no co-pays. This morning, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced it was issuing a final rule providing contraceptives without co-pays and refused to expand the religious employer exemption.

Over the summer in its temporary rules, HHS deemed birth control a necessary preventive health service for women, thus requiring coverage without co-pays by the Affordable Care Act. It also would allow a narrow set of religious employers to deny this critical coverage to their employees. But that didn't satisfy opponents of contraception. They wanted the coverage to be dropped, or at least to expand the exception to nearly 1.5 million employees and the women in their families. HHS stood firm, taking a giant step forward in protecting women's health.

Join us in thanking Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius for standing firm and issuing a final rule providing women access to birth control with no co-pays.  Read more »

We were disappointed by Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius’ decision to overrule the evidence-based decision reached by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to remove the age restriction on emergency contraception. So it didn’t really come as a surprise when President Obama voiced his support for Sebelius’ decision (watch it here).

But that doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt. Even worse was how Obama defended Sebelius’ decision – speaking as a father about his daughters. Emily Douglas from The Nation and Rebecca Traister from Salon nailed it when they wrote about Obama’s paternalism.

If President Obama and Secretary Sebelius are concerned about 11 and 12 year old girls accessing emergency contraception without fully understanding how to use it, perhaps they should consider investing in comprehensive sex education programs. Not making emergency contraception readily available, unfortunately, doesn’t mean that young girls won’t need it, it just means that when they do, they will face significant hurdles in obtaining it. And unfortunately that means, these girls may face an even bigger challenge – unintended pregnancy. Read more »

The reaction to recent decision by Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius that overruled the evidence-based decision reached by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on removing the age restriction on Plan B One Step, a form of emergency contraception, has largely centered around young women and how their access to emergency contraception will continue to be hindered.

We’ve already written about how we think the science should have been allowed to speak for itself.

But we also want to underscore that young women are just one group of women who are affected by this decision. In reality, all women continue to be affected by the age restriction, as emergency contraception will continue to be kept “behind the counter” at pharmacies, so pharmacists can verify the age of those purchasing it, instead of on the shelves alongside other over the counter medicines (and likely far from the bubblegum). Read more »

Today, despite all evidence showing that Plan B One-Step should be available over-the-counter to all women no matter their age, the Secretary of HHS, Kathleen Sebelius, told the FDA that it could not make Plan B One-Step available without a prescription for women under 17. This isn’t just speculation about what happened behind closed doors – this is straight from the horse’s mouth in the form of a letter from Secretary Sebelius to FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, M.D. Determinations of drug safety should be left to scientists, not political appointees. President Obama has said this himself – and ironically the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy is currently working to implement a policy to ensure the integrity of scientific work across the government. And so, it appears that these principles don’t apply when the women’s health is at issue.

Secretary Sebelius’ letter says she decided to intervene because there isn’t not enough research showing that girls of the youngest reproductive age, those as young as 11, could understand when the medication is needed and how to use it. But according to an article in The Washington Post earlier this week, Plan B One-Step’s manufacturer provided the FDA two studies as part of its petition to remove the age restriction. One study showed that between 72 and 96% of girls ages 12 to 17 understood the packaging. The second study showed that girls ages 11 to 16 could use the product properly and safely. The research is there. It was reviewed by FDA scientists. The FDA Commissioner herself stated that the scientists found the research conclusive that Plan B One-Step should be available without prescription for women under 17. The final score should be Science-1, Politics-0. Instead it’s the other way around. Read more »