{"id":18785,"date":"2023-09-01T14:03:16","date_gmt":"2023-09-01T18:03:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?p=18785"},"modified":"2023-09-06T17:34:14","modified_gmt":"2023-09-06T21:34:14","slug":"usa-today-suggests-contraceptives-as-a-back-to-school-supply","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/09\/usa-today-suggests-contraceptives-as-a-back-to-school-supply","title":{"rendered":"USA Today Suggests Contraceptives as a Back-to-School Supply"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Shutterstock.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

With back-to-school season in full swing, a recent <\/span>USA Today<\/a>\u00a0health article made a startling suggestion for what to pack for teens and young adults: contraception. The list also suggested Fentanyl strips and Narcan, COVID-19 tests and getting a booster. It also recommended that parents ensure their children have access to mental health resources. The article suggested parents look into the soon-to-be-released\u00a0<\/span>first over-the-counter (OTC) birth control pill<\/span><\/a>, Opill, which has been approved by the FDA for release in 2024. The article also offered a list of other OTC options, including condoms, contraceptive sponges, and spermicide. It also stressed the importance of emergency contraception, mainly the morning-after-pill or Plan B.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>NPRoffered similar advice during its \u201c<\/span>All Things Considered<\/span><\/a>\u201d podcast. The segment featured a college-bound young woman by the name of I\u2019laysia Vital as she prepared to leave California to attend a historically black college (HBCU). The podcast focused particularly on Texas\u2019s abortion bans, with one nurse who helps students in California obtain birth control lamenting, \u201cMany students here are just totally floored when I tell them that these laws are different in the states that they\u2019re going to. They can\u2019t believe that they can\u2019t get an abortion in this country.\u201d The nurse, Arin Kramer, can write prescriptions for up to a year\u2019s worth of contraception in California, where parents are not required to be notified about their children\u2019s access to birth control. Vital chose to receive a birth control implant, Nexplanon. She will be attending her college with the young man she is currently \u201ctalking to\u201d (code for having casual sexual relations with).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Despite <\/span>USA Today\u2019sinclusion of mental health concerns on its back-to-school list, the article failed to mention the link between\u00a0<\/span>increased depression rates<\/span><\/a>\u00a0and oral birth control use in young women. A study from Uppsala University in Uppsala, Sweden, found that women who began taking combined oral contraceptive pills when they were teens had a 130 percent higher incident rate of symptoms of depression than those who began taking the contraceptives later in life. Another 2021 study found that etonogestrel subdermal implants like Nexplanon can lead to abnormal uterine bleeding (AUB), with 80% of the patients reporting AUBs.\u00a0<\/span>The Federalist<\/a>\u00a0criticized the article for what it called treating young girls like pets. \u201cIt calls to mind my\u00a0<\/span>Natural Womanhood<\/span><\/em>\u00a0colleague\u2019s recent comment that we now collectively \u2018talk about our daughters as if they\u2019re the family pet\u2019 \u2014 you know, the cats and dogs we spay for their own health and protection, given that they just can\u2019t help themselves from engaging in their animalistic impulses?\u201d the article criticized.\u00a0<\/span>Albert Mohler<\/span><\/a>, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, criticized the article, saying, \u201cIt doesn\u2019t say that parents are to celebrate sex and drugs and misbehavior by their kids, but it does say they are to facilitate it. That is a major redefinition of parenting.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With back-to-school season in full swing, a recent USA Today\u00a0health article made a startling suggestion for what to pack for teens and young adults: contraception. The list also suggested Fentanyl strips and Narcan, COVID-19 tests and getting a booster. It also recommended that parents ensure their children have access to mental health resources. The article…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":664,"featured_media":18833,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18785","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nUSA Today Suggests Contraceptives as a Back-to-School Supply<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"USA Today suggests that contraceptives pills be included in back-to-school supplies.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/09\/usa-today-suggests-contraceptives-as-a-back-to-school-supply\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" 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