There has been a huge outpouring of concern about the introduction of the morning-after pill. Levonorgestrel is a synthetic progestagen contraceptive that, used in high concentrations (10 to 15 times the contraceptive dose), stops pregnancy when taken shortly after intercourse.
The major concern about levonorgestrel is that one of its major effects is to prevent implantation of a fertilised ovum (early human embryo) and it therefore causes abortion. The risk of killing a human embryo is enough to make this chemical unacceptable in Malta. However, many do not even consider the additional problems of contraception that come with it.
Divorce started to increase three years after the oral contraceptive pill (OC) was introduced in the US in the late 1960s, and the peak divorce rate of 50 per cent was reached about three years after its use reached a plateau (about 10 million users).
Robert Michael of Stanford University has statistically linked 45 per cent of the increase in divorce to contraceptive use. Recent research has shown a potential reason for this link. Little et al, writing in Psychoneuroendocrinology, found that women on OCs show a preference for a less masculine facial appearance in their partners than women not on OCs and documented downstream effects of these changes on real-life partner selection.
They postulate that if a woman on OCs marries and then comes off the pill she might find that her partner is no longer attractive to her, and this would potentially affect the marriage.
Children have been the biggest losers through the widespread use of oral contraceptive pills
Contraceptives such as the pill, intrauterine devices and implants are different from condom usage in that when using them, a woman subjects herself to a protracted, chemically induced sterility. This has three types of negative effects.
First, it causes a change in the brain’s neurobiological functioning over a period and can imperceptibly change behaviour. OCs have been shown to increase jealousy and decrease fear-learning in women using them.
Second, Melanie Phillips, columnist for The Sunday Times, says that a woman’s biology is central to her sense of femininity. A habitual denial of this biology through OC use is a denial of this femininity. She sees that women have started to behave in a sexually opportunistic way that is more typical of men.
And third, OCs cause a protracted separation of the link between the procreative and unitive aspects of the conjugal act, meaning that the sex act must always be open to new life. Removal of this link through contraception excludes God from his prerogative of creating new life.
For this reason, Pope John Paul II said OCs are “profoundly unlawful”. OCs have almost certainly encouraged cohabitation and the use of sex for physical gratification that is prevalent throughout Western society.
Children have been the biggest losers through the widespread use of OCs. They are no longer the primary focus of married couples who use contraception, and many children are scarred by divorce.
Children are made to grow up too early (by sexualising them) and this has been linked to a rise in suicide among the young.
A “feminisation” of society has occurred, and this has been particularly damaging to boys.
When contraceptives fail, abortion is resorted to, and figures show the abortion rate started to increase about eight years after the introduction of OCs and peaked at 25 per cent of pregnancies after contraceptive use plateaued.
It is clear that abortion is often used as contraception, since 37 per cent of abortions in the UK are repeats and 33 women have had at least nine abortions. Levonorgestrel is particularly dangerous as it blurs the division between contraception and abortion.
Pharmaceutical companies, like Bayer, have been a major force in pushing women to use contraceptives regularly, and OCs have been and remain hugely profitable for them.
There is an increasing realisation (see Grigg-Spall H, Sweetening the Pill) that OCs are “chemical slavery” for women. That the Catholic Church is against contraception was confirmed by Pope Paul in his encyclical Humanae Vitae in 1968.
Despite this, many Catholics still use OCs, with most of the clergy not dissenting. It is becoming clear that all contraceptives, but particularly OCs, are a poison for marriage and for society.
The Catholic Church should take the lead in reversing what has been and is increasingly a very damaging experiment for marriage and for society.
Patrick Pullicino is a neurologist.