Talking Points: Women's Reproductive Health in 2008 Election

Individual Life Decisions and Reproductive Health

Questions about Reproductive Health for candidates:

Do you support couples having access to safe and effective birth control options, including emergency contraception?
Do you agree that for women to achieve equality, they must have access to family planning services, including birth control and contraception?
Do you support requiring health insurance plans that cover prescription drugs to cover birth control and contraception?
Do you support expanding current federal funding for Title X and Medicaid so that women with low incomes have more access to birth control options?
Do you support requiring pharmacies to dispense birth control to patients without discrimination or delay?
Do you support comprehensive sex education being taught in schools that includes information about abstinence, contraception and how to avoid sexually transmitted diseases such as HIV/AIDS?
Do you support the Prevention First and Access to Birth Control (ABC) Acts?

In May 2007, Communications Consortium Media Center and Women Donors Network engaged Lake Research Partners to ask voters for their opinions on the seven questions. Here is how they answered:

1. Couples should be able to have access to all birth control options, including emergency contraception. It is their decision whether to use birth control and it should be safe and available. 86% of voters agree.

2. For women to achieve equality, they must have access to family planning services, including birth control and contraception. 81% of voters agree.

3. Health insurance plans that cover prescription drugs should be required to cover birth control and contraception. 80% of voters agree.

4. Comprehensive sex education should be taught in schools that includes information about abstinence, contraception, and how to avoid sexually transmitted diseases like HIV/AIDS. 88% of voters agree.

5. Pharmacies should be required to dispense birth control to patients without discrimination or delay. 82% of voters agree.

6. The federal government should provide funding for birth control for low-income women. 72% of voters agree.

7. Based on the above, it’s clear that Americans support the Prevention First and Access to Birth Control Acts.

DATA from the Moving Forward Project:

On comprehensive sex education, schools can do a good job, probably better than most parents on the biological and scientific aspects of sex education, but it is a parent’s job to provide the moral and ethical guidance. (86% agree)

We need to respect people’s ability to make their own life decisions and not impose our values and views upon them. (83% agree)

The current political debate focuses on abortion. But there is a much broader discussion that needs to happen that includes issues such as birth control, emergency contraception, comprehensive sex education, stem cell research, end-of-life decisions and the HPV vaccine, that are just as important. (81% agree)

I may have one position on birth control, another on abortion and still a third on end of life. Others have their own opinions which may be different than mine. We should each appreciate and respect our individual opinions. Sometimes, we just must agree to disagree. (81% agree)

For teenagers, prevention starts with comprehensive sex education including abstinence.

But, if we are serious about wanting to decrease unintended pregnancies, we also need to make sure birth control is widely available and accessible. (76% agree)

We must respect others’ views and not try to impose our positions on them.

(60% strongly agree, 22% somewhat agree)

We may take varying positions on related issues AND NOT feel constrained to align them to a unified point of view. (54% strongly agree, 28% somewhat agree)

There is a much broader discussion on health issues that needs to be engaged without becoming regularly entangled in the abortion debate. (81% agree, 46% strongly agree, that there is a broader set of issues that needs to be discussed beyond abortion; 59% feel that political differences on abortion shouldn’t hold up this discussion)

Research Figures provided from research conducted by Moving Forward 2006 – 2008, a collaborative of funders and research groups.

Moving Forward on Important Life Decisions (Research: Validation Poll)

Poll of parents in Washington DC, report of findings by Metro TeenAIDS and the DC Healthy Youth Coalition

(Note: Washington DC has the highest rates of HIV and rising rates of STDs)

Finding 1: Regardless of race, the majority of DC parents are concerned with the growing prevalence of HIV and STDs in the District, and believe that preventing unintended pregnancies and HIV begins with comprehensive sex education.

Parents polled were nearly unanimous (98%) in their concern about the rates of HIV and STDs in Washington, DC.
Almost all (93%) of the parents polled think that preventing unintended pregnancies and HIV begins with comprehensive sex education that includes information on refraining from sex.

Finding 2: Parents believe that DC schools are responsible for teaching their children age-appropriate HIV preventions and sex education, and that the role of parents is to provide their children with moral and ethical guidance.

The large majority of parents polled (83%) believe that DC schools are responsible for teaching their children age-appropriate HIV prevention and sex education.
Parents polled see a clear difference between their role and the role of the school in terms of teaching students about sex. Nine out of ten parents (90%) said that, while they are responsible for providing their children with moral and ethical guidance, schools are responsible for teaching the children age-appropriate HIV prevention and sex education. Parents also expressed belief that schools are more effective in providing the biological and scientific aspects of sex education.

Finding 3: Regardless of their race or level of religious practice, DC parents strongly believe that comprehensive sex education that emphasizes abstinence but also teaches about contraception needs to be taught in schools. Parents also want to be informed about what their children are learning in school.

The large majority (83%) of all parents strongly agree that DC schools should ensure that every young person receives all the information he or she needs to make responsible health-related decisions.
Similarly, 85% of parents believe that HIV education is important and that it needs to be included in all grades (K-12). There were no statistically significant difference in response between African American and other parents.
Among African American parents who attend their place of worship once a week or more, 81% believe that age-appropriate HIV prevention and sex education is important. For African American parents who identified as "evangelical" Christians, 85% believe that age-appropriate sex education is important in their child's K-12 education.
98% of parents agreed that the schools should have clear guidelines for sex and HIV prevention education, and that those guidelines should be available to parents.
Parents also indicated that they would like more resources to help them talk to their children about sex. Three out of four parents (75%) report interest in receiving training on how to better communicate with their kids about sex and HIV/AIDS.

Finding 4: Nearly all parents agree that youth should receive HIV prevention and sex education before they begin having sex, with the majority of parents indicating that this education should begin in 6th grade or earlier.

Almost all parents (96.5%) believe that sex education should occur before youth are sexually active. Local data from the 2007 Youth Risk Behavior Survey shows that 30.6% of students in middle school stated that they have already had sex and 10,0% said they first had sex before the age of 11.
A majority of parents polled (77%) believe that schools should first begin to teach HIV prevention and sex education in 6th grade or earlier.
Overwhelmingly, 83% of African American parents polled agree that age-appropriate information about condoms and birth control should be given once lessons on puberty have started.

“New Poll: Parents Overwhelmingly Support Age-Appropriate Comprehensive Sex Ed” (by Scott Swenson, RH Reality Check, October 2, 2008)

WEB RESOURCES:

Moving Forward on Important Life Decisions

Women Donors Network

For more information on comprehensive sex education:

Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS)

Advocates for Youth

Healthy teen Network

For more information on reproductive health & emergency contraception (Plan B):

National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association (NFPRHA)

The Reproductive Health Technologies Project (RHTP)

Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA)