Petition For Free Birth Control

Recently I saw an ad in the paper about how one supermarket was distributing several medications for free, including prenatal vitamins. Several others followed suit, and now prenatal vitamins are easily acquired for free in many areas.

That’s cool; it’s great that pregnant women can have access to prenatal vitamins for free to ensure both their health and the health of their babies. But let’s not pretend that these freebies are in support of women—that, for some reason, these stores are just all pro-woman suddenly and are forking out the bill for the sake of their health. Because if that were the case, they’d be providing free birth control instead.

I know it’s possible, too. When I was pregnant, I was taking a generic vitamin prescribed by my OB/GYN that had a $15 copay. Since then, I’ve tried multiple birth controls—all with varying prices—and I know that one of the lowest prescriptions for birth control out there has a $9 fee—and that’s without insurance or a copay. That’s much cheaper than the prenatal vitamins I purchased, so why can’t the cost of birth control be covered instead (or at least in addition to) prenatal vitamins? As Planned Parenthood says, “Birth control matters. It matters to the young woman finishing college or starting a career. It matters to the family struggling to make ends meet. It matters to the woman suffering from endometriosis. It matters to mothers and fathers who treasure the children they have.”

They also make the point that the new healthcare bill should have included free birth control for every woman in order to help reduce the number of unplanned pregnancies, as well as to ensure the health of every woman in America. Nearly every woman in the country is at risk of an unplanned pregnancy. One in three will be sexually attacked in her lifetime, and even those who are lucky enough to avoid that will still often face unplanned pregnancies that will threaten their lives. With Americans stretching their wallets as far as they can go these days, it is more important than ever to provide every woman the protection she needs against further endangering herself—as well as her family and current children, if applicable—into further poverty or other risks.

If you agree that every woman should have access to no-cost birth control, please click here and sign the petition for free birth control.