Plan B Birth Control


A more sophisticated objection to the policy for subsidizing Norplant, or any other single form of contraception, argues that such a policy interferes with a woman’s right to make her own contraceptive choices. Instead of offering true choice among alternative methods, governmental contraceptive incentive policies effectively force low income women into making a single contraceptive choice. Thus the policy is interfering with their right to choose a contraceptive method by reducing her feasible options to only one form of birth control. Further, by promoting only one form of contraception, the government can mislead women about their contraceptive options, such as the safety of one particular contraceptive method. For example, in Bangladesh it is not clear to the extent women were informed about their contraception options prior to being introduced to Norplant. This bias towards a particular contraceptive method can serve the interest of the government, and not necessarily the interests of the women the policy effects. For these reasons, any public policy that deals with contraception should guarantee women a choice of all the different contraceptive methods.


It is important to recognize the Norplant for Consenting Teens policy does not specify that it is the only contraceptive method available to teenagers. As mentioned earlier, provided their costs are affordable, other effective methods could be used, e.g., Depo-Provera. The policy never suggested that no other contraceptive methods should be available to teenagers. Since synthetic hormone birth control methods do not protect against STDs and AIDS, the government should not solely promote this form of contraception. Programs to encourage condom use exist for this purpose.


While it would be optimal that all birth control methods cost the same, contraceptive costs will probably always affect women. It may be a governmental obligation to supply women with affordable contraception, but this does not entail that the government should supply women with every possible form regardless of cost or effectiveness. This is just not practical considering real world costs. However, subsidizing long term contraception may help broaden the contraceptive choices for teenage women. Presently, oral contraception is the most common teenage contraceptive choice. When cost was not a factor, 48% of the teenagers chose Norplant instead. This high rate suggests that the excessive cost of Norplant is denying some teenage women access to their first choice of contraception.

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