Plan B....A Rare Victory For Teen Rights

A federal judge on Friday reversed a contentious Food and Drug Administration ruling and ordered the agency to make the so-called "morning-after pill" available without a prescription to all girls of reproductive age, including those younger than 17.
The ruling by U.S. District Judge Edward Korman in Brooklyn, New York, comes in a lawsuit brought by reproductive-rights groups that had sought to remove age and other restrictions on emergency contraception, as Reuters first reported.
Currently, only women aged 17 and or older can obtain emergency contraception without a prescription. That rule has been in place since December 2011, when Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius overruled an FDA recommendation -- and Commissioner Margaret Hamburg -- to force the agency to limit emergency contraception to young girls.
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In his ruling Friday, Korman said the FDA's rejection of requests to remove age restrictions to obtain the pill had been "arbitrary, capricious and unreasonable," Reuters reported. The 59-page ruling says that Sebelius' actions were "politically motivated, scientifically unjustified and contrary to agency precedent."