The FDA has approved the first emergency contraceptive kit for the U.S. The PREVEN Emergency Contraceptive Kit, developed and marketed by Gynetics, can prevent pregnancy if taken within 72 hours of unprotected sex. The kit will be available by prescription by the end of September.

"It is estimated that nearly 50% of all abortions and unintended pregnancies in this country could be avoided if women had access to emergency contraception," said Anita Nelson, MD, Associate Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at UCLA. Emergency contraceptives ù high doses of certain regular birth controls pills containing ethinyl estradiol and levonorgestrel ù have been available for more than twenty years through doctors and clinics who are knowledgeable of the method and willing to prescribe the pills. But this is the first time that birth control pills have been packaged and marketed specifically for emergency contraception.

The kit consists of four birth control pills, a patient information booklet, and a pregnancy test. Users take the pregnancy test to ensure that they are not already pregnant; then, if the test is negative, they take two of the birth control pills within 72 hours of a suspected birth control failure or unprotected intercourse. Twelve hours later they take two more pills. This regimen is 98% effective at preventing pregnancy.

Another newer form of emergency contraceptive will be before the FDA for approval within the next several months. The Women's Capital Corporation is seeking approval for a progestin-only pill that was developed specifically as an emergency contraceptive. Clinical tests comparing the new pill regimen to the established one which contains both estrogen and progestin (as in the PREVEN kit) found that the progestin-only pills decreased nausea by half, and were more effective at preventing pregnancy.

"Emergency contraceptives are uniquely important to women's health, because they are the only methods women can use after sex to prevent pregnancy," said Sharon Camp, President of Women's Capital Corporation.

Emergency contraception is not the same as mifepristone (RU 486), which causes an abortion in a woman already pregnant. Instead, scientists think emergency contraception works by preventing ovulation, fertilization, and/or implantation of the egg. The pills will not bring on a woman's period ù she will get her period at about the normal time.