Birth Control by the Numbers

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Contraceptives aren’t included in the list of preventive services health insurance companies will have to cover copay-free in new plans starting in September. At least, not yet. Insurance plans will also have to cover a range of preventive services just for women. Health and Human Services is expected to release that list by August 2011, and groups like Planned Parenthood are hoping contraception will be included. Personally, I think birth control should absolutely be covered, especially the long-term methods like IUDs and implants. And as this is a list of preventive services, contraception is, by its nature, preventive. But hard-working lobbyists and the common misconception (pardon the pun) that birth control is a “woman problem” are a powerful double-whammy, so much so that I wonder if they’ll delay this crucial health care step for years, maybe even administrations.

I dug through some medical records and a back-of-napkin calculation showed that contraceptives cost me somewhere between $400 and $500 a year. I don’t know what the median spending for women (and men) using birth control is but I would wager it’s in the billions at least. Making contraceptives free won’t stop all unintended pregnancies, but it would certainly defray the cost for the tens of millions of Americans who use it daily. A few more numbers that make me think free birth control is a good thing, below.

Birth control costs me somewhere between $400 and $500 a year.

99 percent of women ages 15 to 44 who’ve had sex have used contraception at some point.

There are 62 million women in the US ages 15 to 44, of which 62 percent (38 million) are currently using birth control.

More than a tenth of unmarried, sexually active women who don’t want to get pregnant don’t use contraceptives.

Nearly half of all pregnancies in the US are unintended.

There are approximately 1.2 million abortions performed yearly.

18- to 29-year-olds have sex an average of 112 times a year: That’s around $75 in condoms if used once each time.

 

 

 

 

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate