Birth control pills should be available over the counter without a prescription, the American College Of Obstetricians and Gynecologists recommended yesterday. Keep reading »
Tag Archives: contraception
Access To Contraception Is A Human Right, United Nation Declares
Access to contraception is a universal human right, the United Nations has declared. The annual report “State Of The World Population 2012,” released today by the U.N. Population Fund regarding women and children in the developing world, is the first ever to describe contraception as a human right. By doing so, the Associated Press explains, the UN has declared that preventing a woman from access to family planning services (whether through politics, religion, etc.) is an abuse of her rights. Keep reading »
An Open Letter To My Period On The Occasion Of Coming Early
Dear My Period On The Occasion Of Coming Early,
You’ve been arriving like clockwork for 15 years. I was never a woman that had a problem with you coming a few days late. You always showed the telltale signs: I’d feel bloated, I’d want to eat junk, and I’d be weepy. But I didn’t put the pieces together last week, when the following incidents occurred:
- All I wanted to listen to on Spotify were Disney songs.
- I only wanted to eat potato chips and onion dip for dinner on Wednesday night …
- … and then I randomly got super-horny afterwards.
- On Thursday, I started crying in the office, which I have never, ever done before …
- … and then I felt so bloated and puffy in my stockings that Ami had to snip the elastic on top for me.
But Friday morning when I woke up and saw you ruined a pair of panties in the night, I finally understood: you came early. YOU BASTARD. Keep reading »
Free Birth Control Means Fewer Abortions, Says Study (Which Proves Common Sense)
A new study called “The Contraceptive Choice Project” outlined in the journal Obstetrics & Gynecology tracked over 9,000 women in St. Louis and found free birth control led to drastically lower rates of abortion and births by teen moms. The study gave a range of free birth control options to poor and uninsured women (those at the greatest risk for an unplanned pregnancy) between 2007 and 2011.
Access to birth control, including the most effective, implanted options — meant women had fewer abortions: 4.4 to 7.5 abortions per 1,000 women in the study. Not only is that lower than the national average of 20 abortions per 1,000 women but lower than the abortion rate for women in St. Louis, which is 13.4 to 17 abortions per 1,000 women. The Obstetrics & Gynecology study, published yesterday, predicted that one abortion could be prevented for every 79 to 137 women being given free contraception. Keep reading »
I Love My IUD, So Why Didn’t My Doctor?
The first time I went in to get my intrauterine device, or IUD, my doctor asked me if I was in a relationship.
“Um, kind of?” I stammered. “I mean, no. But you know, I hear this is the way to go as far as, you know, protectiveness.”
“Hrm,” she said, flipping her chart closed. This was the first time I’d been to this gynecologist, who ran her practice in my tiny suburban hometown. I was 20, home from school on Christmas break, and tired of frantically eyeing the moon and waiting for my period once a month. Keep reading »
Some NYC Schools Administer Birth Control, Morning-After Pill To Students — So What?
Preg Tests At The Bar
A Minnesota bar has installed a vending machine for pregnancy tests. Read More »
Earlier this week, The New York Post dropped the “exclusive” that nurses at 13 New York City public schools can dispense the morning-after pill and provide oral and injectable birth control, like Depo Provera and the Pill — “without parents’ permission.”
Hitched: Why My Husband Is Getting A Vasectomy
I’ve been walking around with a sketch of a uterus and cervix in my reporter’s notebook for several weeks now, courtesy of my gynecologist. She drew it while explaining to me how an IUD works. I keep it around both because I like it as a conversation piece and because when you write about ladyparts as much as I do, it’s actually quite useful as a reference tool at the office or, you know, the bar. Wherever.
But what I like best about my little IUD sketch is that I don’t need it, because my husband is getting a vasectomy. When it comes to long-term contraception that isn’t sterilization, vasectomies are the bee’s infertile knees. The benefits are many: I don’t have to live with a foreign body inside me (either of biological origin or one made of copper), condom breakage isn’t a constant concern, and neither do I have to rely on hormones or head back to my doctor’s office regularly for a Depo shot. Keep reading »
Missouri To Allow Employers To Refuse To Cover Birth Control, Abortion
Birth Control Victory
Birth control will be covered by most employers under health care reform. Read More »
Bad news out of Missouri this week: employers and insurers who personally oppose birth control, abortion and sterilization will be able to refuse to cover those forms of health care in their employee’s health insurance. Missouri’s Governor Jay Nixon had vetoed the bill, but earlier this week, the Republican-controlled legislature overrode the veto. Keep reading »
Gay Rights, Planned Parenthood On Agenda At Democratic National Convention
Next month the Democratic National Convention will be held in Charlotte, North Carolina, where Democratic delegates will nominate President Barack Obama for their candidate. Such events are not just about nominating a candidate, though, but an overall PR blitz for their party’s values.
Politico has seen drafts (“a starting point”) of convention-planning documents describing the DNC’s alleged plans, most notable of which will include pairs of individuals discussing Obama’s policies in comparison to Mitt Romney’s. But it is the precise people they suggest that leaves a slightly bad taste in my mouth. Instead of a gay couple — the documents explicitly say “not a gay couple” — one pair will be a “parent and a gay son or daughter.” Another pair, who will discuss Planned Parenthood, will be a “husband who talks about how a Pap smear saved his wife’s life,” as well as his spouse.
Elizabeth Banks Stands Up For Planned Parenthood
- Actress Elizabeth Banks continues to be a magical unicorn from my dreams with this just-released video in support of Barack Obama’s 2012 campaign. Banks talks about why she supports Planned Parenthood — when she was a broke college graduate they helped regulate her heavy flow! — and Obama’s overall support for women’s health care. (No one tell her “30 Rock” character Avery Jessup that she did this, okay?) [YouTube]
- Two different people have told me they just couldn’t read this Esquire article about women “whining” because it is just too obnoxious. You’ve been warned. [Esquire]
- An Orthodox Jewish member of the Boro Park neighborhood in Brooklyn does not want security video cameras posted for a bone-chilling reason: he is concerned that any domestic violence captured on camera will be dealt with “outside the community.” [Forward]
- What to do when your friend group has a case of the Creepy Dude. [Captain Awkward] Keep reading »
