Main public health issue is failure to use contraception

EDITOR,--The letter from the Committee on Safety of Medicines to all doctors about the increased risk of thromboembolism in women taking oral contraceptives containing desogestrel and gestodene,1 and the manner in which it was released to the press, has caused predictable public panic. Surely the data should have been presented in the context of the wider issue of the provision of effective contraception. As has been pointed out, protective effects against other diseases must also be balanced, but most importantly the data must be viewed …