Free birth control cuts abortion rate dramatically, study finds

[jackstar7]

http://vitals.nbcnews.com/_news/201...rate-dramatically-study-finds?lite&ocid=msnhp

A dramatic new study with implications for next month’s presidential election finds that offering women free birth control can reduce unplanned pregnancies -- and send the abortion rate spiraling downward.

When more than 9,000 women ages 14 to 45 in the St. Louis area were given no-cost contraception for three years, abortion rates dropped from two-thirds to three-quarters lower than the national rate, according to a new report by Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis researchers.

From 2008 to 2010, annual abortion rates among participants in the Contraceptive Choice Project -- dubbed CHOICE -- ranged from 4.4 abortions per 1,000 women to 7.5 abortions per 1,000. That’s far less than the 19.6 abortions per 1,000 women nationwide reported in 2008, the latest year for which figures are available.

Among teen girls ages 15 to 19 who participated in the study, the annual birth rate was 6.3 per 1,000 girls, far below the U.S. rate of 34.3 per 1,000 for girls the same age.

The study’s lead author, Dr. Jeffrey Peipert, a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Washington University, expected both measures to fall, but even he said he was “very surprised” by the magnitude.

I'm sure this won't put the matter to rest for some people... but I'm glad to see data that seems to prove the theory about this.

 

[DaveSimmons]

It's also much cheaper than paying for food stamps and/or earned income credit.

It's too bad that some think that "every sperm is sacred" and the Republicans are pandering to those loons.

 

[SheHateMe]

When the pro-lifers start crying about abortions, I ask them how they feel about a system flooded with children who are welfare recipients and live in households that use them to get more money from the government.

These people don't care about these babies after they are born.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

When the pro-lifers start crying about abortions, I ask them how they feel about a system flooded with children who are welfare recipients and live in households that use them to get more money from the government.

These people don't care about these babies after they are born.

How about a system where people have free access to birth control \but don't us it so they can have a lot of little checks?

 

[Jeff7]

When the pro-lifers start crying about abortions, I ask them how they feel about a system flooded with children who are welfare recipients and live in households that use them to get more money from the government.

These people don't care about these babies after they are born.

After that point, I think they refer to it as "freedom." :hmm:

They don't want to pay for welfare or care for these unwanted people, but if someone on the other side dares make that same economic argument, they're chastised as being as bad as someone who would throw a full schoolbus into a car compactor.

It becomes philosophical then too, so far as abortion/birth control versus giving birth. Is (being alive + statistically-elevated risk of increased suffering + statistically-increased risk of being prone to socially-unacceptable behaviors later in life) better than nonexistance? If you never exist, you never care, either way. All of the children I haven't had haven't complained in the slightest about my decision not to have children.
And I certainly didn't have any strong feelings about existing or not existing back before I was born. The molecules and atoms comprising my brain were strewn about the planet in a form that was not at all conducive to consciousness or thought or memory. They existed - but they just didn't care, one way or another. And had they never been assembled in the specific manner that allowed that consciousness, they would simply continue to not care.

 

[HomerJS]

According to all those personhood proposals which Romney supports, taking the pill is comitting murder.

 

[Geosurface]

I don't care about them before or after they're born. If you're poor and cannot support having children, or your children are likely to end up being criminal scum because you are, then please, please abort.

If, on the other hand, you are a good, stable couple who would raise children properly, if you're educated and law-abiding and well to do, please have WAY MORE KIDS.

It's an issue of quantity and quality, quantity of high quality people is going down, quantity of low quality people is going up.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

They don't want to pay for welfare or care for these unwanted people, but if anyone dares make that same economic argument, they're chastised as being as bad as hit men.

You know that 48 states have some form of contraceptives covered by medicaid.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

According to all those personhood proposals which Romney supports, taking the pill is comitting murder.

How about this- Any female of child bearing age who is on medicaid is required to have a depo shot or norplant. Screw Romney.

 

[nehalem256]

When the pro-lifers start crying about abortions, I ask them how they feel about a system flooded with children who are welfare recipients and live in households that use them to get more money from the government.

These people don't care about these babies after they are born.

Neither do liberals. They just care about having the government force men to pay for women's choices.

Whether that be free birth control. Free abortions. Or paying for the children that women CHOOSE to have but cannot feed.

 

[Jeff7]

You know that 48 states have some form of contraceptives covered by medicaid.

Tis a good thing. :thumbsup:

 

[alzan]

Neither do liberals. They just care about having the government force men to pay for women's choices.

Whether that be free birth control. Free abortions. Or paying for the children that women CHOOSE to have but cannot feed.

That's right! If you don't like it move to Somalia, where there's little to no government to take your precious money! Be sure to send us a postcard to let us know how that' working for you.

 

[WHAMPOM]

http://vitals.nbcnews.com/_news/201...rate-dramatically-study-finds?lite&ocid=msnhp



I'm sure this won't put the matter to rest for some people... but I'm glad to see data that seems to prove the theory about this.

We needed a study to find this out?? face/palm

 

[shira]

Neither do liberals. They just care about having the government force men to pay for women's choices.

Whether that be free birth control. Free abortions. Or paying for the children that women CHOOSE to have but cannot feed.

But the undeniable fact is that if you don't provide free birth control and you don't provide free abortions, lots of babies will be born who will be end up being a burden on society.

The yearly cost of birth control pills is about $600 (assumes no insurance coverage). That's $600,000 per 1000 girls. For those girls NOT given free birth control pills, there's an excess of 28 babies born every year for every 1000 girls. According to this website . . .


http://www.urban.org/publications/308015.html

. . . 3/4 of all babies born to young teens goes on public assistance. That's 21 extra babies who must be supported to age 18. You do the math: Include food, housing, education, and medical costs. According to this Fox News article . . .

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...t-spending-increases-state-funding-decreases/

. . . the average annual per-student cost of public education alone is about $10,500. That's $2.9 MILLION for K-12 for our 21 babies. I don't have the specific figures for the other cost areas I listed, but I don't think it's far fetched to assume that our 21 babies are going to cost society at least $5 million over the first 18 years of their lives.

What about abortion? According to this report . . .

http://www.plannedparenthood.org/files/PPFA/pregnancy_and_childbearing.pdf

. . . the annual teen pregnancy rate in 2006 was 71.5 per 1000 girls. We know that 34.3 of those girls gave birth, so let's assume that the remaining 37.2 pregnancies were terminated by abortions. An abortion costs about $1000, so spending $37,2000 to fund those abortions prevented 37.2 births, of which 3/4, or about 27.9, would be welfare babies. That's another $6.7 million the public doesn't have to spend.

So, you pay them $637,000 for birth control and abortions now, or you pay them a LOT more later. Your choice.

Stop bitching about irresponsible women. Stop proposing absurd solutions (forced sterilization) that will NEVER be adopted. Deal with reality as it is.

 

[MovingTarget]

No shit. Thats its primary purpose - preventing unwanted pregnancy. Imagine that.

But yeah, lets go ahead and cut Planned Parenthood and switch to abstinence-only education. That'll do wonders for the abortion rate.

 

[Sonikku]

Default Free birth control cuts abortion rate dramatically, study finds

That is a contradiction. Birth control can't lower the rates of abortion when birth control IS abortion.

No shit. Thats its primary purpose - preventing unwanted pregnancy. Imagine that.

But yeah, lets go ahead and cut Planned Parenthood and switch to abstinence-only education. That'll do wonders for the abortion rate.

95% of all they do is abortions.

 

[ichy]

Pro-lifers will still be against birth control because they do not want to actually prevent abortions. What they do want is to control people.

 

[Rainsford]

That is a contradiction. Birth control can't lower the rates of abortion when birth control IS abortion.

And while that's certainly convenient for your argument, I don't think you'll find a lot of people even among the most extreme pro-lifers to agree with you. Birth control, for the most part, prevents fertilization. While pro-lifers generally argue that a fertilized egg is exactly the same as a living, breathing human, I can't imagine many will argue the same about an UN-fertilized egg.

95% of all they do is abortions.

Not so much...
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-m...l-says-abortion-services-are-well-over-90-pe/

 

[nehalem256]

But the undeniable fact is that if you don't provide free birth control and you don't provide free abortions, lots of babies will be born who will be end up being a burden on society.

The yearly cost of birth control pills is about $600 (assumes no insurance coverage). That's $600,000 per 1000 girls. For those girls NOT given free birth control pills, there's an excess of 28 babies born every year for every 1000 girls. According to this website . . .


http://www.urban.org/publications/308015.html

. . . 3/4 of all babies born to young teens goes on public assistance. That's 21 extra babies who must be supported to age 18. You do the math: Include food, housing, education, and medical costs. According to this Fox News article . . .

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...t-spending-increases-state-funding-decreases/

. . . the average annual per-student cost of public education alone is about $10,500. That's $2.9 MILLION for K-12 for our 21 babies. I don't have the specific figures for the other cost areas I listed, but I don't think it's far fetched to assume that our 21 babies are going to cost society at least $5 million over the first 18 years of their lives.

What about abortion? According to this report . . .

http://www.plannedparenthood.org/files/PPFA/pregnancy_and_childbearing.pdf

. . . the annual teen pregnancy rate in 2006 was 71.5 per 1000 girls. We know that 34.3 of those girls gave birth, so let's assume that the remaining 37.2 pregnancies were terminated by abortions. An abortion costs about $1000, so spending $37,2000 to fund those abortions prevented 37.2 births, of which 3/4, or about 27.9, would be welfare babies. That's another $6.7 million the public doesn't have to spend.

So, you pay them $637,000 for birth control and abortions now, or you pay them a LOT more later. Your choice.

Stop bitching about irresponsible women. Stop proposing absurd solutions (forced sterilization) that will NEVER be adopted. Deal with reality as it is.

I will stop bitching about irresponsible women when you stop expecting me to bail them out for their irresponsibility. Sounds fair to me.

If you really cared about cutting welfare spending. You would support my policy of mandatory abortions for women who could not afford children (paid for by loans to them, so net cost $0). It would save every penny that free BC does plus the cost of the BC plus the cost of supporting all the women who CHOOSE to have a child they cannot afford.

But really support for free BC has nothing to do with saving the tax payer money. It has everything to do with getting the government to bankroll women's choices. Why should I care about reducing the abortion rate?

 

[nehalem256]

Pro-lifers will still be against birth control because they do not want to actually prevent abortions. What they do want is to control people.

Fair enough,

Pro-lifers want the government to discourage women from being sluts.

Pro-choicers want the government to bank roll women being sluts.

Seems true to their positions

 

[Rainsford]

Fair enough,

Pro-lifers want the government to discourage women from being sluts.

Pro-choicers want the government to bank roll women being sluts.

Seems true to their positions

It's almost hard to understand how social conservatives can't manage to capture the female vote... It's not so much that you think birth control is inherently about negative sexual behavior (although that's pretty ridiculous too), it's that you think it's about negative sexual behavior only for women.

 

[thelastjuju]

birth control IS abortion.

Not everyone agrees with that. They are close, but I understand why someone from your further end of the spectrum on this issue would see it that way.

Also the 95% statistic sounds really far off/ All the top google searches for "Planned Parenthood 95% abortion" start with: "ORRIN HATCH CLAIMS"

I will stop bitching about irresponsible women when you stop expecting me to bail them out for their irresponsibility. Sounds fair to me.

How about bailing out all the irresponsible MEN on wall street though..?

:sneaky:

 

[shira]

I will stop bitching about irresponsible women when you stop expecting me to bail them out for their irresponsibility. Sounds fair to me.

If you really cared about cutting welfare spending. You would support my policy of mandatory abortions for women who could not afford children (paid for by loans to them, so net cost $0). It would save every penny that free BC does plus the cost of the BC plus the cost of supporting all the women who CHOOSE to have a child they cannot afford.

But really support for free BC has nothing to do with saving the tax payer money. It has everything to do with getting the government to bankroll women's choices. Why should I care about reducing the abortion rate?

You're advocating a policy that will NEVER be implemented, even if it weren't completely at odds with the U.S. Constitution. So why do you even bother to make such absurd posts.

As to reducing abortion rates, my previous post said nothing of the kind. Since you're so caught up in being forced to pay for women's choices, I would think you'd be overjoyed at the prospect of REALISTIC policy that would reduce the cost of women's choices.

 

[Wreckem]

You know that 48 states have some form of contraceptives covered by medicaid.

And republicans are trying to chip away at that by excluding certain providers while at the same time promoting religious ones.

Take Texas for example. The past budget cycle they slashed funding to the Women's Health Program. This caused a lot of providers to shut down. At the same time they will no longer cover any services/birth control from Planned Parenthood, even if the Planned Parenthood in question does not perform abortions. Most PPs in Texas do NOT have abortion facilities.

So basically once the legal wrangling over that issue is over and the ban on PP takes effect, you are virtually left with very few providers. And the majority of the ones left will have religious affiliations and might not actually offer birth control(Womens Health Program covers more than just birth control). In fact once the ban on PP takes effect, the city I live in won't have a single provider because the rest shut down earlier this year because of lack of funding. And thats with a population of 230k.

 

[ichy]

Fair enough,

Pro-lifers want the government to discourage women from being sluts.

Pro-choicers want the government to bank roll women being sluts.

Seems true to their positions

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