I'm sure all of you have heard of Viagra, a pill that treats erectile dysfunction. Within months of the release of the drug in 1998, approximately half of prescribed Viagra was compensated by insurance. Those who didn't get Viagra covered by insurance began to file lawsuits.
And yet, it has been an ongoing battle for decades to get contraceptives to be covered by insurance. Women have demanded for birth control to be affordable and accessible, with only a little bit of luck. In 1994, from large insurance companies, only about half cover birth control. Fortunately, with the Obama Care Act, it was mandated that contraceptives be covered, and yet that has been undermined by companies such as Hobby Lobby, arguing that they do not have to support health insurance that covers birth control. Most women pay for contraceptives completely or mostly out of pocket today.
The argument has been that Viagra is needed to treat a medical condition, while using contraceptives is a "lifestyle" medical choice. It isn't necessary, or so they say. Another interesting point is that such little research has gone into sexual dysfunction of females, even though it has huge prevalence among the US population.
Coverage of birth control continues to be an ongoing debate, and with current people in office, it doesn't look very promising to make any progress towards ensuring coverage and access of birth control to women.
If insurance will cover Viagra, why do they continue to refuse to cover contraceptives?
Sources
[1] Chen, A. (2016). "Covering Viagra, but Not Birth Control?" JSTOR Daily.
[2] Benshoof, J. (1998). "By Covering Viagra, Insurers Show that Men's Sexual Well-being is Still More Vital than Women's." Chicago Tribune.
The assumption that birth control is prescribed for "lifestyle" reasons may require more examination. Approximately 60% of birth control users don't take it solely for pregnancy prevention, and roughly 1/3 of teens prescribed birth control are taking it exclusively for pain reduction or dermatologic reasons (source: https://www.guttmacher.org/news-release/2011/many-american-women-use-birth-control-pills-noncontraceptive-reasons). Birth control can be prescribed for a number of reasons, including: acne reduction, to modulate painful periods, to treat endometriosis, to prevent the worsening of PCOS (which, if left untreated, can result in infertility, cancer and death), to treat gender dysphoria (some trans men and nonbinary people get IUDs or other birth control that can stop menstruation entirely, often greatly improving their mental health), and to prevent future life-threatening pregnancies (as in the case of a woman with a previous history of eclampsia, for whom a second pregnancy could prove fatal). For these reasons, birth control and hormone therapy should be covered by insurance.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with what Ariana said. One of my friends uses birth control for an endocrine condition that she has, and just the other day she was lamenting the fact that she has to pay so much for it, even though she uses it for treatment.
ReplyDeleteOne of the other things this made me think about was last semester in anatomy. One thing we talked about pretty frequently is the fact that, as a general rule, more is known about male anatomy than female anatomy. As an example, one paper we read talked about how damage to a certain nerve plexus in males could cause infertility, but they did not study females nor did they mention the need to study this in females as well. I was talking with Dr. Ghedotti about this, and he says while scientists are catching up, there's still a way to go. Maybe if there was more of a push to understand more about female reproductive anatomy/physiology, perhaps that might convince people about the necessity of birth control, particularly in their use as treatments for certain conditions.
(If anyone is interested in the paper, the link is https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/joa.12251)