"RICHMOND -- Planned Parenthood Advocates of Virginia officials say anti-abortion lawmakers will soon try to restrict access to contraceptives.

Planned Parenthood is launching a five-year, million-dollar campaign to warn Virginians that their access to contraception could be at risk in the near future.

Planned Parenthood officials announced the campaign yesterday at the state Capitol. They said they're appealing to the public because their effort to draw a legal line between contraception and abortion, in the form of a bill, was shot down during the General Assembly session.

David Nova, president of Planned Parenthood Advocates of Virginia and Planned Parenthood of the Blue Ridge, said the group began to worry about access to contraception several years ago when the General Assembly first rejected a bill to make it easier for women to get the "morning-after" pill.

Nova said their fears mounted after lawmakers approved a "conscience clause" bill that would allow pharmacists to refuse to fill prescriptions for contraceptives if the pharmacist felt such contraceptives could perform abortions by preventing implantation of a fertilized egg.

The final straw, Nova said, was the failure of a bill that spelled out the difference between contraceptives and abortion.

"We all kind of experienced a collective feeling of dread that the lines between contraception and abortion were being blurred by those who oppose abortion rights," Nova said.

Many forms of contraception work to prevent fertilization. But some, such as birth-control pills or shots, can also work to prevent implantation of a fertilized egg. To some people, that constitutes abortion, Nova said.

Nova and his Planned Parenthood colleagues fear that anti-abortion lawmakers will soon act to ban such forms of contraception. So they're undertaking this campaign in hopes of stirring up grass-roots opposition.

Planned Parenthood is starting the effort by placing 11 billboards around Richmond. The signs bear slogans such as "Think you have the freedom to choose contraception? Virginia says think again" and "Will Virginia make you travel out of state for birth control pills?"

The billboards also direct people to a new Web site, askplannedparenthood.org, which has more information on the group's efforts.

But anti-abortion advocates say Planned Parenthood is creating an issue where none exists.

"The idea that conservatives want to force women to leave Virginia to get birth control must be Planned Parenthood's idea of an April Fool's joke. It is so ridiculous and without merit it cannot be taken seriously," said Victoria Cobb, spokeswoman for the Family Foundation of Virginia.

Cobb said the bill that sought to define contraception "was an attempt to codify an overly broad definition of contraceptives" that was inconsistent with medical definitions. She also noted that there has been no bill in the Assembly to restrict access to contraceptives.

But there are groups that believe, as Nova said, that contraceptives that prevent implantation of a fertilized egg are essentially aborting a life.

"Many of the most popular methods of contraception really aren't. They don't prevent the union of sperm and egg, they destroy a human being," said Judie Brown, president of the Stafford-based American Life League. "Planned Parenthood likes to muddy the water and claim the scientific facts aren't what they say they are. We oppose all abortion, and that includes opposing some forms of birth control that we know abort children. And any abortion should be outlawed."

Brown's group does not lobby lawmakers on legislation, although she said the group sends out information packets to legislators in all states.

She said she has been called by some Virginia legislators on the "morning-after" pill.

Brown said she thinks that at some point, state legislatures will act to restrict contraceptives.

To Planned Parenthood, that would defeat the purpose of lowering the abortion rate.

"If you send a message that contraception is bad, it raises the unintended pregnancy rate," Nova said. "The more you restrict access to ways to prevent unintended pregnancies, the more unintended pregnancies you'll have and the more abortions you'll have." " (Chelyen Davis, Freelance Star, April 3, 2003)