Study: 'Birth-control sabotage’ a problem

By MICHELE MUNZ
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Clinicians may need to screen young women for another problem if they have an unintended pregnancy and admit they aren’t using birth control — intimate partner violence.

A study released in this month’s issue of Contraception found “reproductive coercion” common among 16- to 29-year-old women. Researchers surveyed 1,300 women at five reproductive clinics in Northern California and found 53 percent had experienced physical or sexual violence from an intimate partner.

Of those, 35 percent also reported pregnancy coercion or birth-control sabotage such as damaging condoms or destroying contraceptives. Obviously, this group’s risk of unintended pregnancy increased significantly.

“This study highlights the under-recognized phenomenon where male partners actively attempt to promote pregnancy against the will of their female partners,” said the study’s lead author, Elizabeth Miller, assistant professor of pediatrics at University of California Davis School of Medicine.

The Family Violence Prevention Fund says reproductive coercion can also result in sexually transmitted diseases, miscarriage, infertility, coerced abortion and poor birth outcomes such as preterm birth and low-birthweight babies.

Its Web site, www.KnowMoreSayMore.org features women sharing their experiences.

Also released: After 15 years of significant declines, the nation’s teen birth rate rose 4 percent in 2006, and the teen abortion rate increased 1 percent.