Plan B vending machines installed on colleges campuses across the country
Breccan F. Thies
Vending machines with Plan B have been installed on at least 37 college campuses across the country.
After the overturn of Roe v. Wade, activists increased their push to secure vending machines with products such as Plan B, condoms, sexual lubricants, and pregnancy tests on college campuses.
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The activist group Emergency Contraception for Every Campus, which is a project of the American Society for Emergency Contraception, “envisions a world in which everyone, everywhere can access affordable EC without stigma or barriers.”
Some of the “stigma or barriers,” according to the group, are locking up over-the-counter pregnancy-ending drugs and users not wanting to ask store employees for doses. Another problem for the group is cost prohibition, in which it believes the drugs should be sold for “as close to cost as possible — ideally under $10,” as opposed to the typical pharmacy price of about $40 to $50.
“Some pharmacies still ask for proof of ID, based on outdated age restrictions,” the group’s website states.
Lawmakers in Washington are looking at a proposal to fund the vending machines at $10,000 per unit.
Opponents of the machines believe they perpetuate a sexually wanton culture that devalues human life and personal dignity.
“For decades, we’ve been teaching kids that the worst possible sexually transmitted disease they can get isn’t HIV or syphilis, but rather pregnancy, as if the worst thing in the world anyone could get as a surprise is a baby,” American Principles Project President Terry Schilling told the Washington Examiner. “Most of us weren’t planned, and some of us weren’t even wanted, but these factors don’t change the status of our human dignity.”
Schilling said that a healthy culture would teach young people about “natural family planning, sexual risk avoidance, and the infinite amount of options for humanely dealing with unplanned pregnancies.”
The proliferation of vending machines also comes as the abortion pill has been deregulated, and some states such as New York, California, and Massachusetts have already passed laws requiring campus student health centers to provide the pills.
Abortion pills such as mifepristone are different from Plan B because they induce abortions and require a prescription. In 2021, the Biden administration made it much easier to access the pills, getting rid of the requirement that the pills be dispensed in person, allowing them to be prescribed online and sent through the mail.
This year, the Food and Drug Administration issued a rule allowing retail pharmacies such as CVS and Walgreens to carry the drug, which further expanded its proliferation.
The FDA approval of mifepristone was challenged by a federal court ruling in Texas, but the case is on appeal in the 5th Circuit.
The trend toward deregulation has some worried the abortion pill could be approved for over-the-counter sale and included in the vending machines. The trend, coupled with the lack of medical supervision, is dangerous, according to SBA Pro-Life America Communications Director Mary Owens.
“Eliminating medical supervision and providing dangerous abortion pills on college campuses is reckless, puts women in grave danger, and is not the answer to an unplanned pregnancy,” Owens told the Washington Examiner. “Obtaining an abortion pill without any labs, ultrasounds or medical supervision is dangerous and removes informed consent of what occurs during an abortion.”
Owens explained such access to the drugs would leave women “isolated in their dorm room as they self-manage their own abortion, forcing them to suffer emotionally and not know what to do when they deliver their child into the toilet.”
The push has also come at the same time pro-abortion activists have tried to discredit the work of pregnancy centers, which offer assistance to women so that they can bring their babies to term.
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“Any woman who finds themselves with an unplanned pregnancy deserves community support and resources, and there are over 3,000 pregnancy centers nationwide that stand ready to help women facing that difficult situation,” Owens said.
Emergency Contraception for Every Campus did not respond to a request for comment from the Washington Examiner.