At today's meeting, Dr Sallam is expected to submit a draft law which provides penalties of no less than one year's imprisonment and a LE5,000 fine for those who trade in unauthorised medicine. The controversy is not devoid of melodrama. According to published reports, three wives, worried about the health of their husbands, pleaded with the ministry to stamp out the Viagra black market. Post-coital pills, Osman insisted, should only be used by women in an emergency. Women in regular sexual relationships, he added, should use the usual contraceptive pills which are taken throughout the month.
Women can take estrogen and progestogen hormones which are already present in contraceptive pills.
The protection rate for morning-after pills is between 80 and 90 per cent. But there are other methods, said Osman, such as the insertion of the IUD after intercourse to induce the ejection of the fertilised egg. The Postinor literature, said Osman, dangerously gives the impression that it can be used as a substitute for the usual contraceptive pills that are taken daily throughout the month. Osman explains that these pills may affect the stomach and cannot be used regularly because of the increased and sudden induction of hormones. Osman expressed fear that if Postinor was made available through government family planning centres, it could be misused as a substitute for contraceptive pills, especially in remote rural areas where awareness is not high.