We'd love to be able to work with other pro-life organizations who share our conviction that every person has a right to access the family planning method that is best for their life and health, and who see family planning as one important tool for ending abortion. Are you familiar with such a group? Please contact us!
Tag: Prevention
What new research on hormonal contraceptives means for family planning freedom
A study recently published in Lancet Infectious Diseases found that women with HIV-positive partners who used the injectable hormonal contraceptive DMPA were twice as likely to contract the virus than women who did not use DMPA. In addition, HIV-positive women using DMPA were twice as likely to pass the virus to their HIV-negative partners than women who did not use it. (Other hormonal contraceptives were also implicated in increased HIV transmission, but so few women in the study were using them that the sample size was not large enough to yield statistically significant findings.)
The theory is that the hormones have an immunological effect. The difference between the DMPA and non-DMPA-using groups was not due to a difference in condom use; that was one of the variables the scientists controlled for in their analysis.
The researchers noted that contraceptive use was based on self-reporting, raising the possibility of recall bias. They recommend doing followup studies using randomized trials to confirm or disconfirm the findings. They also recommend that:
Women should be counselled about potentially increased risk of HIV-1 acquisition and transmission with hormonal contraception, especially injectable methods, and about the importance of dual protection with condoms to decrease HIV-1 risk. Non-hormonal or low-dose hormonal contraceptive methods should be considered for women with or at-risk for HIV-1.
The New York Times reports that the World Health Organization has scheduled a meeting for January to discuss whether the evidence is strong enough to warn women that DMPA may increase their risk of contracting HIV.
We advocate informing women that there may be a risk. However, we also acknowledge some complicating factors. Pregnancy itself can be dangerous for many women, particularly those in the developing world who may have already had many children and who lack access to modern health care. Pregnancy may even increase the possibility of HIV transmission. If women stop using effective contraception for fear of HIV transmission, they might end up less safe — particularly if this study is later disconfirmed by randomized trials.
What does all of this mean for family planning freedom? The position taken by All Our Lives is that women should have access to all safe family planning methods, and all relevant information about them based on the strongest available evidence, to be able to choose the appropriate methods for their own situations. Some methods are safe for some women and not for others; that's one reason that a wide range of methods needs to be available to every woman. Many women in the developing world use DMPA because it can be administered by personnel with little medical training and each injection lasts three months, meaning that it can be used in situations where women have little access to medical facilities. Better access to medical care would allow more women to choose from alternative methods that do not carry an increased risk of HIV transmission.
Our Pro Contraception Article in New Consistent Life Ethic Journal
Thanks to Aimee Bedoy, editor of the new consistent life ethic journal Life Matters. She published our article "Family Planning Freedom Is Prolife" in the inaugural issue.
All Our Lives has encountered active censorship not simply when we have sought cooperative action on birth control with prochoice groups, but when we have tried to civilly raise this issue within the organized prolife movement as such.
Never mind (as the article points out) that most who identify as prolife on abortion support contraceptive rights. We welcome this opportunity to get matters out in the open.
Please read, support, and send your own work to this welcome new journal.
More Evidence That Contraception Is Prolife
According to a 2006 paper from the British medical journal The Lancet, "Family Planning: The Unfinished Agenda", 13% of global maternal mortality is caused by abortions that are medically unsafe for women (as well as unborn children, for whom all abortions are unsafe). However, an estimated 90% of these maternal deaths (as well as the accompanying fetal deaths) could be prevented through access to effective family planning methods. 90%! That would represent an 11.7% drop in total maternal mortality worldwide (as well as prenatal mortality). This agenda remains unfinished, alas. But look how many lives it could save, whatever abortion's legal status in the countries where it becomes a reality.
Three quick news links
Busy day today, but I wanted to draw people's attentions to a few items:
The “Communities of Color Teenage Pregnancy Prevention Act,” HR 2678, recognizes that a broader approach is needed to address teen pregnancy in communities of color, including the role coercion and violence plays in unintended pregnancy, and invests in getting young people of color the information and skills they need to build healthy relationships. It further addresses the need among racial or ethnic minority and immigrant communities for culturally appropriate information and education on issues of reproductive and sexual health.
Know Your Rights: A Conference Call for Pregnant and Parenting Students!
Wednesday, August 10, 3pm Eastern
Pregnant and parenting students have a right to equal educational opportunities! Interested? Get more information about protections for students against discrimination.
Court: No tax-funded abortion in healthcare law
"Whether it is possible, under contingent circumstances, that at some point in the future, upon the execution of x, y, and z, that the [Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act] would not prevent taxpayer funded abortion is entirely different from providing for 'tax-payer funded abortion,'" the opinion states. "The express language of the PPACA does not provide for tax-payer funded abortion. That is a fact, and it is clear on its face."
Vital services for women to be available without co-pay under Affordable Care Act
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has accepted the Institute of Medicine’s recommendations about women’s health care services that should be provided by all insurers without co-payment under the Affordable Care Act. Among these services are HIV screening and counseling, domestic violence screening and counseling, support for breastfeeding, and contraception. These recommendations will be in effect for insurance policies with plan years beginning on or after August 1, 2012. Religious organizations which are opposed to contraception may opt out of having that coverage provided by their insurance.
All Our Lives applauds HHS’s acceptance of the recommendations. Having these vital services available without a co-payment will help more women and children live healthy lives as well as making it easier for women to avoid unintended pregnancy and abortion.
Contraception Is Prolife
Participation in today's "Birth Control: We've Got You Covered" blog carnival is a no-brainer for a prolife group like All Our Lives. Access to the contraceptive supplies and services of one's own choosing is essential to the voluntary, effective prevention of unintended pregnancies and abortions.
In other words, contraception is prolife. Pro the lives of women-and men-who choose to delay conception or forego it altogether. Pro the lives of children, who have the best chance at a good life if they are conceived by parents who are prepared to bear and support and love them.
Our organization calls itself prolife because we believe-on grounds open to people of all religions and no religion- that everyone, unborn or already-born, has a right to live, and live as well as possible, with all necessary supports from every level of human society. For real. That includes a thoroughgoing commitment of public policies and resources to make voluntary family planning as widely accessible and affordable as possible.
A word like "prolife" should mean what it says. All Our Lives will soon launch our "Contraception Is Prolife" educational campaign, starting with a downloadable slide presentation that explains in more detail just what we mean when we say this. We welcome your visit and participation here, and hope you will return to learn more about our "Contraception Is Prolife" effort. We have already challenged misinformation about Plan B that a Family Research Council staffer gave on National Public Radio. Please sign up for our email updates, subscribe to our Twitter feed, or join our Facebook group.
Contraception: Hidden access issues
While on the surface it may seem that women in the U.S. have adequate access to contraception—99% of women who have had sex have used birth control on at least some occasions—the bare statistics obscure some underlying access issues. For one thing, not all methods work equally well for all women’s situations. A woman who can afford condoms but would be better served by the pill or an IUD has an access problem if she can’t afford to go to the doctor to get those methods prescribed for her.
Let’s look more closely at those figures from women who have had abortions. It is true that 54% of women who have abortions used some form of birth control during the month when they conceived. Of course, that doesn’t mean that they remembered to use it every time, or used it correctly. Proper counseling—one of the services recommended by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) to be covered without copays under the Affordable Care Act—could help with that. But inconsistent use can also be due to an access problem. For instance, a staggering 76% of women who used the pill report using it inconsistently. Many of them could be having trouble getting their pills on time every month. Most women can only get one to three months’ worth of contraception prescriptions at a time; one study showed that allowing low-income women to get twelve months’ worth of pills at a time decreased the odds of unintended pregnancy by 30%, and the odds of an abortion by 46%. Alternatively, some women may need a method that doesn’t have to be remembered every day, such as an IUD—but those can have a large up-front cost. Reproductive coercion is another factor that can cause women to use contraception inconsistently. Though it isn’t strictly an access issue, family planning clinics and other health care providers have a role to play in helping women recognize and prevent reproductive coercion. Reproductive coercion often accompanies partner violence, and screening for such violence is also recommended by the IOM. Finally, some of the women who report using contraception were actually using ineffective methods such as withdrawal. They could benefit from counseling and access to more effective methods.
If 54% of women who have abortions were using contraception during the month when they conceived, that means 46% weren’t. Twelve percent of these women directly cited barriers to access as a reason for contraceptive nonuse. Another 10% reported that their partners didn’t want to use contraception; again, this could be reproductive coercion at work. Others didn’t know they were at risk for unintended pregnancy; counseling could certainly help there. Still others cited concerns about side effects or bad experiences with contraception in the past. Many of these women could benefit from assistance to help them find and afford a method that works well with their particular bodies.
Access is a complicated issue; it’s not simply a matter of whether a woman can afford a packet of pills every month or whether the pharmacy down the block sells condoms. There is still plenty of room for improvement in the way we make contraception information and methods available to women. If the Department of Health and Human Services accepts the IOM’s recommendations, more women will get the help they need to avoid unintended pregnancy and abortion.
Great news for women’s and children’s health
The Institute of Medicine has issued its recommendations for a range of preventive health services that it says should be covered for all U.S. women without a co-pay under the Affordable Care Act. Several of these recommendations improve not only women's health, but that of their children as well.
The eight recommendations include:
- screening for gestational diabetes
- HPV testing as part of cervical cancer screening for women over 30
- counseling on sexually transmitted infections
- counseling and screening for HIV
- contraceptive methods and counseling to prevent unintended pregnancies
- lactation counseling and equipment to promote breast-feeding
- screening and counseling to detect and prevent interpersonal and domestic violence
- yearly well-woman preventive care visits to obtain recommended preventive services
The recommendations will now go to the Department of Health and Human Services, which is scheduled to issue the final rule for insurers in August.
The report will be discussed Wednesday, July 20, at a public briefing beginning at 10 a.m. EDT at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. A live audio webcast of the briefing will be available at www.nationalacademies.org if you would like to listen.
Plan B Is Prolife
All Our Lives is preparing to take part in the National Women’s Law Center “Birth Control: We’ve Got You Covered” blog carnival on July 21. Please join if you too have a blog and support the inclusion of contraceptives as essential, copay-free preventive services in US health plans.
National Public Radio ran a story this morning called “Birth Control Without Co-Pays Could Soon Become Mandatory”. Unfortunately an interviewee for the story repeated an all too often repeated bit of misinformation, in the name of prolife.
As well as contacting this interviewee, All Our Lives sent this message to NPR.
–In your piece on [the effort to abolish] contraceptive copays, Jeanne Monahan of the Family Research Council explains her opposition with the misinformation that the emergency contraceptive Plan B causes abortions. Levonorgestrel emergency contraceptives like Plan B work *prior* to conception, by suppressing or delaying ovulation and possibly by altering sperm function. They do *not* prevent implantation. (Details: http://www.cecinfo.org/custom-content/uploads/2012/12/ICEC_FIGO_MoA_Statement_March_2012.pdf). Anyone who identifies as prolife has the responsibility to expand access to Plan B and indeed all contraceptive methods, because this is one of the most powerful ways to help women prevent crisis pregnancies and abortions.–