The Easiest Way to Prevent Pregnancy Isn't the Pill

Birth control pills may have revolutionized a woman's jurisdiction over her own uterus, but as any woman who's ever popped those tiny tablets will tell you, there's flaws in the execution. For a prescription that needs to be taken once a day, every day, there's a fair amount of finesse involved. It seems a simple enough task, but if you ask a room full of women if they've ever forgotten to pop a pill during an early morning rush out the door, or their daily dosage slipped their mind when their head hit the pillow after a few too many cocktails, you'd get a crowd full of raised hands.

Now, there's more information than ever that suggests oral contraception isn't the way to go when it comes to preventing pregnancy. A new study in The New England Journal of Medicine shows that for young women who use IUD's, the rate of teenage pregnancy and the number of abortions significantly drops versus those who use alternative prevention methods. This discovery came to light through a St. Louis, MO-based program that evaluated the resulting pregnancies, births, and abortions of 1,404 participants who were given complimentary IUD's. The timing is in sync with the thoughts of medical experts. This revelation comes just a week after the American Academy of Pediatrics revamped their guidelines to encourage doctors to recommend their patients use IUD's as their foremost method of contraception.

In a perfect world, it seems that IUD's should be the answer to the plight of both pro-life and pro-choice advocates. For those who are against abortions, an increased use of IUD's means that there will be less unplanned pregnancies, and thus, fewer terminations. The catch? Oftentimes those who are anti-abortion are also against long-term forms of birth control, just like IUD's (think of Hobby Lobby.) And the cycle of ignorance towards women's health begins again. Groan.

Related:

The Contraceptive Cheat Sheet

Primary Protection: The History of the Pill

California Is Giving You FREE Birth Control Because It's the Law

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