By Victoria Morphy

Sex. It’s on most teenagers’ minds. It’s also discussed in our homes and at schools where we learn about safe sex, sexually transmitted diseases and abstinence. Sex is also front and center in our media. Young and invincible, we think we know it all and nothing can happen to us from a sexual encounter. Yet, what if the condom breaks or a couple has spontaneous unprotected sex. Pregnancy seems too sudden and too soon at 17. What are our options? With a pill for almost everything that ails us the availability of an Emergency Contraceptive (EC) pill has become an issue that not everyone is swallowing.

Even at seemingly progressive schools like Yale University there is little awareness about the availability of the EC. Laura Janoff, a student and co-coordinator of the Reproductive Rights Action League at Yale (RALY) believes people are seriously misinformed. Janoff has been working for the past few years to fight for “reproductive rights on campus, in the community and across the nation.” She attributes the lack of acceptance of EC on campus to a confusion with the abortion pill, RU486. As such, she and other members of RALY recently organized an EC information day on campus.

What is EC? Simply, it is a large dose of birth control hormones that can be taken up to five days after unprotected sex. (The abortion pill causes a miscarriage up until two months into pregnancy). Why is awareness about EC so important? According to Susan Yolen, Vice President of Public Affairs for Planned Parenthood (Ct), about 50% percent of high school seniors have had sexual intercourse. While it is not known what percentage of these seniors have had unprotected sex, it is known that very few are on birth control or know anything at all about EC.

Yolen believes that as a country we are in denial about the health risks, to say nothing about the abortion rates, these figures imply. We have become somewhat myopic she said by controlling abortion by promoting abstinence. “The US government is spending hundreds of millions of dollars on funding abstinence which discusses birth control methods in a negative context,” said Yolen. “Political extremists are giving kids religiously veiled rationales for their behavior outside of religious schools - instilling fear of sex, as well as medically inaccurate information.” As such, many teens believe EC kills life, when in fact the EC is a drug that prevents conception.

Women like Laura Janoff and Susan Yolen are not looking to make a choice for other women. They are trying to update our views about sex and unwanted pregnancies by giving the public correct information. Knowing about EC would likely cause a significant decrease in the 25% of abortions performed every year.

Yet the government’s stance on abstinence education has not paved the way for proactive choices. Abstinence education has also impacted major pharmacies at chains like Wal-mart, which refuses to sell the EC. While the company line is a “business decision,” this does nothing to eradicate the misconceptions that surround the EC.