A Government Threat to Birth Control

A new set of health laws that could be proposed by the government sometime in the next few weeks has women's health activists steaming. If the laws are implemented, they claim, women will have a harder time getting access to contraception.

Video: Birth Control Methods

The legislation, a draft of which was leaked last week to the New York Times, stokes the debate over when human life begins by taking the position that birth control that prevents the implantation of a fertilized egg actually results in abortion. It would prohibit federally funded medical facilities—including teaching hospitals and Planned Parenthood clinics—from refusing to hire doctors who don't want to dispense birth control pills and other types of contraception that may cause the expulsion of a fertilized egg. (It's already illegal to discriminate against doctors who refuse to perform abortions.) The new laws would also override state laws that require hospitals to offer emergency contraception to rape victims and those that require employers to provide contraceptives along with other prescriptions.

Late last week, Sen. Hillary Clinton called the planned rules (which could be imposed without congressional approval) "damaging" and a "dire threat to women" and warned that contraceptive coverage would "disappear overnight" if enacted. Dozens of organizations, including the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and Planned Parenthood, have also voiced their objection, especially to the government's definition of the onset of pregnancy. According to ACOG, "conception is the implantation of the fertilized ovum," based on the ability to clinically detect pregnancy through elevated hormone levels. Hormonal contraceptives—especially those that contain only progesterone like the minipill and the Mirena intrauterine device—don't always suppress ovulation, so sometimes a fertilized egg is expelled before it's implanted in the uterus. Refusing to comment specifically on the draft proposal, the Department of Health and Human Services yesterday issued a statement saying it is "exploring a number of options" to enforce the antidiscrimination laws put in place by Congress.