Some of these drugs are not like the others

One more weekend to go in the show I'm working, so I'm exhausted, so I can't write a very lengthy post, so I'm just going to ask one question:

- This week, Congress, the president, various religious groups and seemingly all of Facebook have been arguing over whether employers should be required to include contraceptives in their health care plans. Women use any number of hormone-based medications (the pill, IUDs, patches, etc.) to regulate ovulation, with the purpose of controlling things like ovarian cysts, endometriosis and, yes, the timing and number of their pregnancies. This basic health care is actually up for public debate, complete with Congressional hearings.

Meanwhile...

- Another celebrity dies in connection with prescription drug abuse. (Yes, I know Whitney Houston's autopsy results haven't yet been made public, but allegedly she drowned after taking too much Xanax.) This may be yet another high-profile case because of Houston's fame, but raise your hand if you don't know someone who's abused prescription drugs. (If you didn't raise your hand, it's because you just didn't know about it.)

All over this country there are people getting high off of completely legal drugs that they either got from their own prescriptions, or lifted from someone else who had a legit prescription. All over this country, there are people mixing completely legal medicines in combinations that could kill them.

Prescription drug abuse is rampant, and it's largely invisible in ways that snorting cocaine or smoking pot aren't.

But you don't see Congress convening hearings on Xanax, or Vicodin, or Adderall. I wonder why that is? Maybe the birth control pill manufacturers need better lobbyists.

(True story: Back in 1980-whatever, my third grade class's DARE officer said to a girl who was freaking out because, as she said, "My Mom takes us to a drug store ALL THE TIME!" - "It's okay, those aren't real drugs." Ten years later, a college classmate had to keep his Ritalin locked in his car because people kept stealing it.)