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From: liz@tove.UUCP (Liz Allen)
Newsgroups: net.abortion
Subject: Re: Who's Life Anyway?
Message-ID: <270@tove.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 11-Jul-85 12:55:09 EDT
Article-I.D.: tove.270
Posted: Thu Jul 11 12:55:09 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 17-Jul-85 03:33:18 EDT
References: <556@bgsuvax.UUCP> <283@vaxwaller.UUCP>
Reply-To: liz@tove.UUCP (Liz Allen)
Organization: U of Maryland, Laboratory for Parallel Computation, C.P., MD
Lines: 40
Summary: effectiveness of the Pill

In article <481@ihu1e.UUCP> mjv@ihu1e.UUCP (Vlach) writes:
>> 	A 99.9% reliability for the pill means that if a woman is
>> using the pill and is sexually active, she has a .1% chance of getting
>> pregnant in a given year, NOT each time she has sex.
>
>I hate to see this 99.9% rate flying around in so many messages.  The pill
>is ~95-97% effective when used EXACTLY as directed.

When I worked at the Pregnancy Aid Center in College Park, the
information we had was that the pill was >99% effective when used as
directed.  And, barring house fires, etc, it is not that difficult to use.

>Just want you all to realize that pregnancy prevention is not as effective
>as one might think.  Also, I would suspect most abortions go to young women
>who have never used birth control and don't know where to get it without
>their parents finding out.  

Providing birth control to a teen mainly communicates that it is
ok to have sex.  Too many teens believe that "it can't happen to
me" and don't bother using it.  Remember, too, that teens don't
plan ahead very well.  Many of them don't plan to have sex yet and,
when faced with a situation when they need to make a choice, it
makes it all that much more difficult to say no when so many people
are telling them that it's ok.  How many of those that say yes are
going to have planned to use birth control?  I think we need to
teach teens old fashioned things like the self-control and discipline
needed to be able to make a decision and stay with it.

There was a meeting in Washington, DC a few months ago of a task
force that the mayor appointed to look into the problem of teen
pregnancy.  The high school students kept getting up and saying
"tell us not to do it", but the Task Force didn't hear that.  They
just wanted to say "But if you do, be sure to use birth control".
(I could get off, at this point, on some of the other amazing things
happening in the public schools these days, but I will hold off...)
-- 
Liz Allen    U of Maryland   ...!seismo!umcp-cs!liz   liz@tove.ARPA

"This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you:  God
 is light; in him there is no darkness at all" -- 1 John 1:5