You Might Be Losing Access to Birth Control Thanks to Donald Trump
By Bridget Todd | June 7, 2017, 4:51 p.m.
Category: Birth Control, Health Care Equity
We’ve come a long way. But now Trump wants to take us backward.
Are you one of the 99% of sexually active women who has used birth control? Thank Griswold v. Connecticut.
Wednesday marks the 52nd anniversary of the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision that recognized the first constitutional protection for birth control and helped lay the groundwork for women to be able to decide when and if they want to have a child. But unbelievably, this milestone comes as the Trump administration is expected to try to roll back access to birth control — threatening its enormous benefits.
Birth Control’s Societal Benefits
Birth control has been nothing short of revolutionary for society. Birth control has dramatically improved the ability of women to participate actively in the U.S. economy:
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One-third of wage gains women have made since the 1960s are the result of access to birth control
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Young women's access to the pill has been concluded to be an influential factor in enabling them to stay in college.
The Trump administration wants to change all that. They’re taking steps to roll back access to birth control under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and threaten the social, economic, and health benefits that women have now depended on for generations. If Trump gets his way, one of the most basic and personal decisions — when and if to have a child — could be limited by a woman’s boss.
View Our 100 Years of Birth Control Timeline
Trump Rule Would Let Your Boss Decide
Under the Obama administration, even if your employer objected to birth control, nearly everybody was guaranteed to still have it covered by insurance at no out-of-pocket cost. Thanks to this ACA birth control benefit, more than 55 million women now have access to birth control without copayments, which saved them an estimated $1.4 billion on the pill in the ACA’s first year alone. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, after the ACA’s birth control provision took effect, fewer than 4% of Americans had to pay out of pocket for birth control pills. That number was more than 20% before the law’s passage.
If the Trump administration moves forward with a proposal leaked last week, women across the country could be denied insurance coverage for birth control on a whim from their employer or university. This new rule would mean no matter where someone works or goes to school — from private universities to huge, publicly-traded companies — they could be denied insurance coverage for birth control based on their employer’s or school administrator’s decision. And out-of-pocket costs for birth control pills can run about a hundred dollars— extra money that many simply don't have.
Take Action: Tell Donald Trump We Won’t Go Back
In this moment, on the 52nd anniversary of the Griswold decision, it’s appalling that we are at risk of losing a lifetime of progress. Don’t let these extremists turn back the clock on reproductive health.
Tags: Obamacare, Donald Trump, ACA, Tom Price, AHCA, birth control
