Several letters from British physicians addressed to the British Medical Journal are printed complaining about the 1969 announcement of Englands Committee on Safety of Drugs that high estrogen content in oral contraceptives causes a high risk of thromboembolism. The physicians were concerned that they were not informed before mass publication and broadcast of the announcement and did not have the opportunity to examine the clinical evidence themselves in order to draw their own conclusions. It is contended that the announcement had a seriously detrimental effect on the thousands of women taking oral contraceptives in England who were frightened by the warning and felt their physicians had not treated them properly.