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BIRTH CONTROL "BACK UP" IS AT CENTER
OF GROWING EFFORT Health Care Providers and Public Health Organizations
Urge Women to Keep Washington, DC - A coalition of more than 70 national, state, and local organizations will mark the first day of spring - March 20th - with activities designed to inform women that they have a "second chance" to prevent pregnancy. Recently, women's health advocates have stepped up efforts to increase awareness of - and access to - emergency contraception, a "back-up" birth control method that significantly reduces the risk of pregnancy when taken soon after sex. While emergency contraception is safe, effective, and FDA-approved, only a small proportion of American women have ever used it. The Back Up Your Birth Control Campaign is part of a host of new initiatives - ranging from national legislation to local public awareness efforts - that reflect a growing consensus in the U.S. about the importance of preventing unintended pregnancy. "It's time to make emergency contraception a household word," said Kirsten Moore, President of the non-profit Reproductive Health Technologies Project, the campaign's coordinator. "Every woman in America deserves to know that she can have a 'back-up' plan on hand to prevent pregnancy, even if she has sex when she didn't expect to or didn't want to - or she thinks the condom broke." Emergency contraception (EC) contains a higher dose of the hormones found in daily oral contraceptives - and works much the same way the Pill does. When used within 72 hours of unwanted or unprotected sex or contraceptive failure, EC reduces a woman's risk of becoming pregnant by up to 89 percent. (EC should not be confused with Mifeprex, or RU-486 - the drug approved in the U.S. to terminate a pregnancy in the early stages.) Widespread use of emergency contraception could potentially reduce by half the roughly 3 million unintended pregnancies that occur in the U.S. each year. But according to a recent survey by the Reproductive Health Technologies Project, more than 60% of voters do not know of a product or drug that has been proven effective in preventing pregnancy if used within days of unprotected sex. Still, researchers believe that use of emergency contraception accounted for 43% of the decline in the numbers of abortions performed in 2000 alone - a further indicator of the possible public health benefits of this back-up birth control method. The Back Up Your Birth Control campaign was created because word-of-mouth efforts remain the key to increasing women's awareness that they have a second chance to prevent pregnancy after sex. Today, there are two dedicated emergency contraceptive products on the market - Preven, containing both estrogen and progestin, and Plan B, a progestin-only formula. The makers of both are boutique pharmaceutical firms that have not been able to launch large-scale, direct-to-consumer advertising campaigns. While certain types of oral contraceptives that can also be used as EC are manufactured by larger companies, none has asked the FDA for approval to include directions for emergency contraceptive use in their pill labeling - a pre-requisite for them to conduct brand-based advertising. Members of Congress have stated their plans to re-introduce federal legislation that would allot $10 million to educate women and health care providers about emergency contraception, a measure that the Reproductive Health Technologies Project survey found garnered support from an overwhelming 72 percent of voters. Americans find EC's narrow window of effectiveness to be the most compelling reason for government involvement in raising awareness of this back-up birth control method - and agree that women should know about this option in advance of an emergency situation. Given this strong public support, legislators in Kansas, Missouri, New Mexico, and West Virginia have introduced measures to develop their own state-sponsored EC awareness campaigns. Pharmacies have also been a focus of efforts to improve women's knowledge and access. Large national drug store chains are now informing women who fill prescriptions for certain brands of oral contraception that they can ask their health care provider about EC. Meanwhile, in three states - Washington, California, and Alaska - woman can obtain a prescription for emergency contraception directly from a pharmacist, without having to visit her health care provider first. Legislation pending in another eight states - Hawaii, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, New York, Oregon, Texas, and West Virginia - would allow women to do the same there. A number of other types of legislation are also being considered at the state and local level, including requirements that a woman who has been sexually assaulted be informed about and offered emergency contraception when she seeks care in an emergency room. More information about emergency contraception and the Back Up Your Birth Control Campaign can be found at www.backupyourbirthcontrol.org - 33 - |