TikTok removes videos promoting birth control misinformation after The Independent investigation

Exclusive: Myths suggesting that birth control is more dangerous than beneficial were spreading to millions, an investigation by Hebe Campbell reveals

Friday 18 April 2025

TikTok has removed videos promoting birth control misinformation after The Independent found that some influencers were spreading unproven claims to millions of users.

An investigation by The Independent and tech company Alethea revealed misleading videos claimed the risks of birth control, such as cancer or psychological side effects, outweigh its benefits.

Continued; https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/tiktok-birth-control-misinformation-influencers-investigation-b2729567.html


Contraceptive access and teen childbearing: Lessons from Sweden

Kelly Ragan
17 Apr 2025

The Trump administration has frozen federal funding for contraceptive services at a time when abortion rights have already been rolled back across much of the US. This column suggests that economists and policymakers aiming to predict the consequences of these policies look to Sweden, where oral contraception (‘the pill’) was introduced 60 years ago, when a national abortion ban was still in place. The Swedish data suggest that for teens who face the greatest risk of pregnancy, small differences in access costs can have large consequences for childbearing rates.

Reproductive rights have been curtailed in the US in recent years. The latest restriction is the Trump administration’s freeze on federal funding for subsidised access to contraceptive services for millions of Americans (The Guardian 2025). Economists and policymakers who want to predict the consequences of this abrupt policy reversal should look to Sweden. My analysis of Swedish data – which indicates that small changes in the sales of contraceptives, when driven by access costs, can have large consequences for teen childbearing  (Ragan 2025) – suggests the Trump administration’s restrictions on contraceptive services will be borne by American teenagers, who will become parents earlier than if they’d had access to contraception.

Continued: https://cepr.org/voxeu/columns/contraceptive-access-and-teen-childbearing-lessons-sweden


Netherlands – Significant majority chooses to use contraception after conversation in abortion clinic

April 16, 2025
National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM)

For a period of one year, the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport gave a number of abortion clinics extra time to have conversations about contraception, particularly with people in vulnerable situations. After these conversations, almost 70% opted to use contraception. Almost half opted for long-acting options such as an IUD, and almost one in five opted for a short-acting option such as the pill. These are the results of an evaluation by RIVM of measures to improve access to (free) contraceptives.

Continued: https://www.rivm.nl/en/news/significant-majority-chooses-to-use-contraception-after-conversation-in-abortion-clinic


Mothers Urged To Teach Their Daughters Sex Education

Taiwo Jimoh 
April 8, 2025

A non-governmental organization, Leadership Initiative for Youth Empowerment (LIFE), has urged mothers to teach their daughters comprehensive sex education to prevent unwanted pregnancies and unsafe abortions.

The Executive Director of LIFE, Abiodun Unegbo, who made this call on Tuesday while addressing Journalists in Lagos, noted that Nigeria has one of the highest rates of maternal deaths resulting from unsafe abortion.

Quoting statistics from the World Health Organization (WHO), Unegbo said approximately 2,870 women die each year in Nigeria due to complications from pregnancy and childbirth.

Continued; https://newtelegraphng.com/mothers-urged-to-teach-their-daughters-sex-education/


How will Canada lead on sexual and reproductive health and rights in the era of Trump?

Barely two months into his Presidency, Donald Trump has devastated global sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR).

by Jacqueline Potvin
March 21, 2025

On January 24, Trump reinstated the Mexico City Policy (the “global gag rule,”) which restricts US global health funding from going to any non-government organization that provides abortion services, advocacy, or information.

This reinstatement will harm women and people who can become pregnant, limiting their access to important healthcare information and services. Its effects will be exacerbated by wide-sweeping cuts to US Agency for International Development (USAID) funding and staff. These moves come at a time when Canada’s own commitments to global sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR), which have recently been strong, may be at risk. 

Continued: https://rabble.ca/human-rights/how-will-canada-lead-on-sexual-and-reproductive-health-and-rights-in-the-era-of-trump/


Foreign Aid Cuts Will Lead to 34,000 More Pregnancy-Related Deaths in Just One Year

The Trump administration’s foreign aid cuts have decimated global reproductive health programs, leaving millions without contraception and putting tens of thousands of lives at risk.

March 19, 2025
by Elizabeth Sully and Amy Friedrich-Karnik, Ms. Magazine

For nearly 60 years, the United States has been a leading force in global health, investing in international family planning and maternal, newborn and child health efforts. Yet, within the first two months in office, the new Trump administration has eviscerated nearly all foreign assistance, including critical global health programs. 

The move marked an aggressive attack on women’s health by dismantling U.S. investments in family planning assistance and putting essential reproductive care at risk—even though foreign assistance for global health represents just 0.1 percent of the U.S. federal budget … a negligible saving for the United States, yet a devastating loss for the world.

Continued: https://msmagazine.com/2025/03/19/trump-foreign-aid-cuts-reproductive-health-crisis/


Polish presidential frontrunner pledges to sign bills on contraception, Silesian and constitutional court

Mar 15, 2025
Notes from Poland

Rafał Trzaskowski, the presidential candidate of Poland’s main ruling party, says that, if he wins the election, the first bills he would want to sign would be to allow prescription-free access to the morning-after pill, recognise Silesian as a regional language, and overhaul the constitutional court.

Those bills have been blocked by current President Andrzej Duda, an ally of the conservative opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party. Trzaskowski says that he also wants to sign “as soon as possible” a bill liberalising the abortion law, though the ruling coalition has not yet managed to pass one.

Continued: https://notesfrompoland.com/2025/03/15/polish-presidential-frontrunner-pledges-to-sign-bills-on-contraception-silesian-and-constitutional-court/


Time is running out: let’s accelerate progress towards gender equity in health care

8 March 2025

Frances Longley, FIGO Chief Executive

This international Women's Day we must reflect on the of the serious challenges women and girls face. 

Every 11 minutes, a woman or girl is killed by a member of her own family​. One in three women have suffered physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence, non-partner sexual violence, or both​.

Worldwide, 800 women die every day worldwide from complications related to pregnancy and childbirth​ and 40% live in countries where abortion laws are restrictive​. 270 million women worldwide have no access to modern contraception​.

Continued: https://www.figo.org/blog/time-running-out-lets-accelerate-progress-towards-gender-equity-health-care


Trump’s reimposition of the Global Gag Rule denies many vital reproductive healthcare

Critics say the policy has led to deep cuts in funding for family planning

By Kelly Blanchard & Evelyn Opondo
Feb 17, 2025

On 24 January, US President Donald Trump issued guidance to reinstate the Global Gag Rule (GGR). This policy will lead to harm and human rights violations for women, girls and people of all genders worldwide, affecting their sexual and reproductive rights and well-being.

The GGR, formally known as Mexico City Policy or the Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance policy, originally put in place by former president Ronald Reagan and expanded under the first Trump administration, says organisations that receive US funding may not provide information about abortion or abortion care. Non-US based NGOs are ineligible for US government global health funding if they use their own funds to provide, refer for or promote access to abortion.

Continued: https://mg.co.za/thought-leader/2025-02-17-trumps-reimposition-of-the-global-gag-rule-denies-many-vital-reproductive-healthcare/


Family Planning And The Politics Of Reproduction In India 

Family planning practices have both implicitly and explicitly played a role in defining the construct of the 'modern woman,' and how women are represented, regulated, and monitored through their reproductive and sexual capacities.

by Abirami M   
Feb 14, 2025 

In India, a woman’s body is not entirely her own—it is a site of social politics, of state intervention, and of deeply entrenched class and gender hierarchies. Family planning practices have both implicitly and explicitly played a role in defining the construct of the ‘modern woman,’ and how women are represented, regulated, and monitored through their reproductive and sexual capacities. From colonial-era anxieties about Indian fertility to post-independence sterilisation campaigns disproportionately targeting Dalit and Adivasi women, reproductive policies have long been a means of controlling marginalised communities rather than empowering them. 

Colonial legacies of family planning 
To truly grasp the complexities of reproductive rights and sexualities in India, mapping its history is a good place to start. Taking its roots in the colonial era, British administrators argued that Indian marital, sexual, and familial practices were responsible for Indian impoverishment. Among some Indian intellectuals and reformers, anxieties about overpopulation and focus on numbers as a mode of governance produced a new reproductive politics that linked reproductive rights to the economy.

Continued: https://feminisminindia.com/2025/02/14/family-planning-and-the-politics-of-reproduction-in-india/