New Law Benefits Women, Planet

By Amy Phillips Bursch, Media Relations Manager

Happy Contraception Day! Today’s the day that most insurance plans in the United States have to start covering birth control with no co-pays under the Affordable Care Act. As a woman who’s spent a fair amount of effort and money avoiding motherhood, I couldn’t be more pleased.  Birth control can be very expensive, and laws that help increase access are a great thing in my book.

But you don’t have to be a woman of a certain (reproductive) age to benefit from expanded access to contraception. Contraception is good for the women you care about, their families, their communities and the planet. And who could possibly be against that? (Well, plenty of people, but I’ll touch on that later.)

First up: Women. It’s not just the childless by choice who benefit from contraception. Birth control allows women to wait to have babies until they’re ready. When women can plan and appropriately space their pregnancies, they and their babies are healthier. According to the reproductive health gurus at the Guttmacher Institute, “Women whose pregnancies are planned are more likely to receive timely prenatal care. They are less likely to smoke or drink during pregnancy, and more likely to breast-feed once their baby is born.” That’s good stuff.

Using these just got a lot more affordable. (outcast104/Flickr)

The typical American woman only wants two children. Contraception allows families to have the number of children they’re comfortable raising – and give those children the best possible shot at success. A child who’s received good health care and a great education is more likely to grow up to be a productive member of society. That helps entire nations succeed – and in our complex, interconnected global economy, we need as much success as we can get.

So how does contraception help the planet? In one number: 26.8 billion. That’s how many people the United Nations projects will be sharing Earth in 2100 if we don’t slow down population growth. Keep in mind that we have about 7.1 billion people on the planet right now. Picture nearly four times as many people struggling to find (and afford) water, food and energy on a planet where water, food and energy are already scarce in many areas. It’s a recipe for disaster, but it’s an entirely preventable disaster if we take action.

By Guttmacher’s projections, 222 million women in the developing world don’t have access to affordable and appropriate contraception. Here in the United States, nearly half of all pregnancies are unplanned. By expanding access both here (thanks, President Obama!) and abroad (thanks, Melinda Gates, UNFPA, USAID and friends!), we can reduce unintended births, slow down population growth and give the people of 2100 a little more breathing room.

Sounds great, right? Not to everyone, unfortunately. The tentacles of sexism are long and tightly wrapped around societies – including ours. The collective right-wing freakout over the Affordable Care Act’s contraception mandate is only the latest example. While many of us see women’s equality as an inalienable right, powerful interests see it as a threat. That’s why we can’t rest. We have to keep fighting the forces that would be happy to see all women barefoot and pregnant and confined to making sandwiches in the world’s kitchens.

The Affordable Care Act’s contraception coverage is a great step in the right direction, and it will help women. And men. And communities. And right-wingers, even though they claim otherwise. And our planet. And the people of 2100. Here’s hoping the long fight for gender equity is done by then.

Wanted: $1 billion for women

By John Seager, President, Population Connection

Editor's Note: This guest post appeared July 10 on the reproductive health blog RH Reality Check.

July 11th is World Population Day – arguably the most important made-up holiday we’ve had in years. Why do I say that? Because it’s the final World Population Day before the 2012 elections, and the choices Americans make in the voting booth will have lasting consequences for people and the planet.

We have two options: We can make family planning a priority and invest the money needed to give women control of their own lives and futures. Or we can allow our nation – and our world – to slide backward.

John Seager

I did not expect that we’d be in this position today. In my 16 years with Population Connection, I’ve never seen anything like the attacks on contraception we’ve witnessed in the past year.  Silly me: I thought the fight over contraception was resolved back in the 1960s. What I hadn’t counted on was the growing political power of people determined to turn the clock back to the ’50s – preferably the 1850s or 1750s.

The examples are numerous and egregious:

• The U.S. House votes to eliminate funding for Planned Parenthood and for Title X family planning programs (created by Republican President Richard Nixon in 1970.)

• The House convenes an all-male panel to decry the Obama Administration’s rule requiring insurance policies to cover contraception.

• Georgetown Law student Sandra Fluke is publicly attacked as a “slut” and a “prostitute” after testifying in favor of the Obama Administration’s rule.

• A House committee votes to end funding for the United Nations Population Fund, or UNFPA, a development program that offers reproductive health care and voluntary family planning services to 500 million women around the world each year.

• At the recent Rio + 20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, the Vatican succeeds in removing references to gender equality and reproductive rights from the final document.

We can expect some of the same right-wing reaction over the London Summit on Family Planning, which begins today.

These actions affect women’s lives and livelihoods – and the health of our world. Adding 80 million people a year to the Earth’s population puts incredible strain on our natural resources. Experts project that in less than 50 years, we might add another 2 billion to 4 billion people to our planet. All of those people need food, water, clean air and space – necessities that are already running in short supply in many areas.

So what can we do about it? First of all, demand that your representatives support policies that ensure women around the world have the power to choose the trajectory of their own lives. About 222 million women around the globe want to delay or end their childbearing but have no access to modern contraception, according to the Guttmacher Institute. Universal access to contraception would slow population growth, give women and girls more power over their own futures and help communities and nations build a better quality of life for all of their people.

Advocate, advocate, advocate. Ask everyone running for Congress to support the Global Democracy Promotion Act, introduced by Sen. Barbara Boxer and Rep. Nita Lowey. This legislation would create a permanent repeal of the odious Global Gag Rule that hurts the world’s most vulnerable women every time it’s reinstated. Let them know how important it is to provide aid to UNFPA and to ensure universal access to contraceptives. Demand comprehensive sex education and the elimination of “refusal clauses” that allow pharmacists and other health professionals to deny treatment.

The United States also must increase funding for voluntary family planning programs. An investment of $1 billion represents our nation’s fair share of the total cost of meeting unmet need for family planning worldwide. It’s a sound investment in our shared future that will save the lives of women and improve everyone’s quality of life.

If you agree, join us and other organizations that work on behalf of these issues. And don’t give up. If we want to achieve women’s rights, a stable population and a healthier planet, we must keep fighting not just on World Population Day, but every day, every week, every year.