This is way on a tangent. What started as a simple comment has digressed into me finding sources about oral contraceptives, a substance that I never mentioned supporting or opposing (so if you were assuming that I’m gung-ho for birth control, please think again). Here’s a source:
prolifephysicians.org/abortifacient.htm
It’s pretty dense so I’ve copied and pasted the part that really gets the meaning across. The point is, drug companies do not necessarily tell you the truth. They don’t lie, but they pick and choose the research that will help them sell drugs. For the pill, women want backups: if one mechanism fails, they feel safer knowing that there is a backup mechanism built into the pill. So the pharm. companies cherry picked 3 mechanisms that have been supported at one time or another so that Ms. Don’t-want-a-child feels safe having sex. I’m not saying it’s ethical, but that’s how it’s done. Anyway, here’s what a pro-life physician website has to say on the subject
A second reason that pro-life physicians may not hold the position that oral contraceptives cause abortions is that they are unconvinced by the evidence. There is ample data to support the first two method of actions of OCs mentioned above. But the third proposed method of action, the so-called “hostile endometrium theory”, has little direct evidence to support it. Drug manufacturers have heralded it from the beginning without proof, and it has been echoed by two generations of investigators without verification. There is indirect evidence that the OC produces a thinner, less glandular, less vascular lining, and there is direct evidence from the field of in vitro fertilization that a thinner, less glandular, less vascular lining is less likely to allow the attachment of the new human being when it enters the uterus. However, when a woman taking OCs does ovulate, the corpus luteum (the ovarian follicle turns into the corpus luteum after ovulation) produces ten to twenty times the levels of both estrogen and progesterone seen in a non-non-ovulatory pill cycle. This results in the growth of stroma, blood vessels, glands, and glandular secretions to help prepare the lining for implantation. If there is no conception after ovulation, the corpus luteum ceases to function about two weeks after ovulation and menses follows. However, if conception occurs following ovulation, the embryo releases the human chorionic gonadotropin hormone (HCG), which stimulates the corpus luteum to continue its function until the placenta takes over hormone production two months later.
The proponents of the “hostile endometrium theory” argue that OCs are abortifacient based upon the third mechanism of action. The medical literature clearly supports the claim that the uterus becomes thinner and less glandular as a result of the OCs, however, the medical literature comes to this conclusion from non-ovulatory pill cycles. It is assumed that this finding in non-ovulatory pill cycles would prevent implantation of the embryo conceived in an ovulatory pill cycle, but this presumption is false. If a woman on OCs ovulates and conceives, everything changes: through the HCG’s affect on the corpus luteum, and the corpus luteum’s release of high levels of estrogen and progesterone, the uterus is able to nourish its new guest very well.
It is noteworthy that in a normal menstrual cycle, on the day of ovulation, the endometrium is not receptive to implantation. If the embryo were to drop down through the fallopian tubes into the uterus on that day, it could rightly be called a “hostile endometrium”. But following ovulation, the corpus luteum transforms this hostile endometrium into a receptive, nourishing bed, where the embryo will attach about one week later after its trip through the fallopian tube, and where the baby will continue to develop until birth.
I include here a statement from pro-life Ob/Gyns, wherein they strongly disagree with those who purport that oral contraceptives cause abortions.
