President Bush Supports "Products and Services", As Long as You Don't Actually Mean Birth Control

By Sara Behmerwohld, Communications Intern

June 28, 2006

After nearly a year of requests from members of Congress, the Bush administration has finally "clarified" its position on birth control.

At a May 26, 2005, press briefing, radio talk show host Les Kinsolving pressed then-White House press secretary Scott McClellan to confirm whether or not President Bush opposes contraception. McClellan doggedly avoided the question, and never provided a legitimate answer.

This evasion inspired Representative Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., who led 43 other members of Congress in writing letters to Bush asking him to clarify whether or not he supported birth control.

The response from the White House came via the Department of Health and Human Services as follows:

Thank you for your letter to President Bush to request his views on access to birth control. The President has asked that I respond on his behalf.

This Administration supports the availability of safe and effective products and services to assist responsible adults in making decisions about preventing or delaying conception.

The Department of Health and Human Services faithfully executes laws establishing Federal programs to provide contraception and family planning services. The Title X Family Planning Program and Medicaid are each significant providers of family planning services.

Additionally, this Administration strongly supports teaching abstinence to young people as the only 100 percent effective means of preventing pregnancy, HIV, and sexually transmitted infections (STIs).

Sincerely yours,
John O. Agwunobi
Assistant Secretary for Health

While at first glance this letter appears to show support for contraception, upon closer inspection, the letter seems more like a non-response from an administration which opposes abortion, and rarely (if ever) supports birth control. It refers to "safe and effective products and services" (as opposed to contraception) that prevent or delay "conception" (rather than pregnancy) for "responsible adults." Apparently less-than-responsible adults are not entitled to these same "products and services," while young people should be denied accurate and complete information about birth control and safe sex.

NOW President Kim Gandy applauded Maloney's efforts to get a straight answer from the White House, and noted that "President Bush didn't say he supports contraception—only methods to prevent conception. That would eliminate some of the most common forms of birth control— including the IUD, the birth control pill, and the morning-after pill (also called emergency contraception). So that leaves what—condoms and the rhythm method? Hardly what I'd consider "support" for birth control."

In reaction to the White House letter, Congresswoman Maloney's office issued a further inquiry focuses on three specific administrative actions that have in fact limited women's access to birth control:

• The elimination of information about emergency contraception in the January 2005 Justice Department guidelines for the treatment of sexual assault survivors.
• Unprecedented stalling by the FDA in approving over-the-counter access to Plan B contraception.
• Failure on the part of the administration to intervene on behalf of women who are refused birth control (including emergency contraception) by their pharmacists.

Maloney has called for a response from the Bush administration on these issues, but it seems unlikely that any real response will be forthcoming.