Congressman says Peruvian Health Minister lied about morning after pill

Lima, Peru, Oct 14, 2004 / 22:00 pm

A Peruvian congressman has accused the country’s Health Minister, Pilar Mazzetti, of violating the Constitution by lying to the country about the abortifacient nature of the morning after pill.

Judith de la Mata, member of the opposition APRA party, said Mazetti has violated the Constitution and has misled the nation.

In a 28-page document addressed to the President of the Congress, De la Mata explains that Mazzetti does not have sufficient basis to disprove the third effect of the drug, which makes it an abortifacient according to Peruvian law.

Mazzetti is also accused of lying in order to implement the so-called emergency oral contraceptive in Peru, thus making a mockery of the country’s laws that prohibit abortion and protect human life from the moment of conception.

De la Mata argues that Mazzetti has intentionally disregarded studies and articles that indicate the presence of the drug’s third effect, as well as statistical analysis that shows that it is not possible that the pill’s only effects are the slowing or inhibiting of ovulation and the thickening of cervical mucus.

Since she became Health Minister, Mazzetti has insisted in all her public appearances that the morning after pill does not prevent implantation of a fertilized ovum, despite the fact that manufactures of the drug acknowledge that it does.

On Thursday, hundreds of Peruvian physicians have  signed a statement opposing it.

The statement recalled that the pill’s abortifacient effect (that of preventing embryo implantation on the walls of the uterus) had been systematically denied by health officials and abortion activists under international pressure.

The statement hinted that local organizations such as INPPARES-IPPF, APPRENDE, Flora Tristán, Manuela Ramos, APROPO, DEMUS, Forosalud, CSRD-Gates Institute and also international organizations such as UNFPA, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Ford Foundation, CLADEM, FIGO, CLAE,  and others were involved in pressuring the Peruvian governments health officials.

Pointing to the misleading attitude of Mazzetti, the physicians demanded the immediate withdrawal of the Morning After Pill and ask the Peruvian Ministry of Justice to fulfill its own duty of protecting the constitutional rights of the embryo.