After reading last week’s article about the new high price of birth control ("Students on the pill cope with price hike," News, Wednesday) all I can ask is, why has our federal government decided to make it harder for us to be responsible adults?†
I am a second-year graduate student with the Graduate College of Social Work, a public affairs intern at Planned Parenthood of Houston and Southeast Texas and a woman who says that planning parenthood is one of the most important decisions in one’s life.
Access to affordable and effective birth control is essential to college students who need it for medical reasons and who have decided that college is not the time to start a family.
The Deficit Reduction Act is forcing college students, like me, to make difficult decisions about our futures. If college students have to decide between paying tuition, rent and buying birth control, it’s a no-brainer.†We need a place to live, but the outcome of that decision could have dire consequences.
My classmates and I want to be successful professionals and phenomenal mothers when we grow up. If students can’t afford birth control, the number of unintended pregnancies on campus is sure to rise.†I can’t imagine that Congress intended that to happen.†
If this price hike is simply an unintended consequence of this legislation, then our elected officials have to fix it. I urge Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-TX, to revisit the Deficit Reduction Act and return affordable birth control to college campuses. Coogs, we must call Hutchison at (202) 224-9522 and insist that she make birth control affordable.
Quiana Whitesell GCSW graduate student
