Expert: Birth Control Pills Ineffective in Stemming Unintended Pregnancies
Birth control pills have done nothing to stem the tide of rising unintended and teenage pregnancies, according to a population and contraception expert at Princeton University.
Professor James Trussell, director of the Office of Population Research at Princeton University, said that birth control pills were "outdated" while speaking last month at the British Pregnancy Advisory Service in London.
"It has not reduced unintended pregnancies in America or anywhere else that has introduced it," he said, according to The Daily Telegraph.
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Trussell added that other forms of contraception too, including emergency contraception and the so called "morning after" pill, have also failed to bring significant progress in curbing unintended pregnancies – accounting for 25 percent of all pregnancies in the U.S. – because of what he said was an excess of unprotected sex.
The only way to bring an end to unintended pregnancies is to resort to stronger and more portent methods of contraception such as implants or the IUD, which prevent the formation of embryos in a woman's uterus, Trussell said.
Pro-life advocates, however, continue to argue that the recognized failure of birth control pills prove that abstinence is the best policy in bringing an end to teenage and unintended pregnancies.
"On teen sex, it's time to stop treating the problem and start preventing it with the only birth control that is 100% effective—abstinence," the Family Research Council (FRC) said in a statement while describing its support for abstinence-based programs for youth.
Many pro-family groups point out that abstinence-based education programs have proved effective in schools.
In a review by The Heritage Foundation, 15 out of 21 abstinence-education programs "showed positive behavioral results in the students, including the delay or reduction of sexual activity."
