Top Pro & Con Arguments

Pro

OTC birth control pills would be more affordable.

Moving the Pill over-the-counter would eliminate the insurance companies as middle-man between women and the Pill, thus making the drugs less expensive.

Jeffrey A Singer, Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute, noted that moving birth control to OTC status could make the Pill less expensive by selling the drug directly to consumers rather than through third-party insurance companies that inflate the prices. [38] [124]

Getting birth control by prescription has several associated costs that would be eliminated with OTC status, including co-pays for doctor’s visits, time taken off work to go to the doctor, childcare, and other related costs. [38] [124]

Uninsured women may also save money by eliminating the insurance companies as middle-man. Uninsured women, about 11% of US women ages 19 to 64, paid $370 on average for a year’s worth of Pills (about $30.83 per month), which was 68% of their total healthcare spending for the year, and about 51 hours of work for someone making the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. Those numbers don’t include what an uninsured woman pays for the doctor’s visit and associated costs (time off work, childcare, etc), which could also be saved by popping into a pharmacy on her regular errands. [39] [40] [124]

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