Fordham Should Prescribe Birth Control

Let's talk about sex.

It is not a conversation that happens often on our campus. Our reluctance to do so, however, recently landed Fordham on College Magazine's list of the most prudish universities.

Add to that conservative attitude Fordham's strict guidelines concerning birth control and contraceptives, in line with most Catholic institutions, and you have a culture where discussions about sexuality and sexual health are taboo.

According to the Student Health Services website, "as an institution in the Catholic, Jesuit tradition, Fordham University follows church teachings on reproductive issues."

The Catholic Church, of course, considers it immoral to prevent conception by any artificial means, including condoms, birth control pills and IUDs.

Not all students attending Fordham, however, realize at first how Catholic tenets reflect on Fordham's policies regarding women's health.

"I'm not Catholic, so I didn't connect the two things," Elizabeth Bolen, FCRH '14, said. "I just assumed that every college does [provide contraceptives]."

"I transferred from a different school in Baltimore, where we could get condoms whenever we needed them, and I already had a [birth control] prescription and everything," Stella Jendrzejewski, FCRH '13, said. "So I didn't even worry about [Fordham's policy when I started] here."

It is hard to place the blame on students for not understanding Fordham's policy, since the full explanation is essentially hidden on the University's website.

One organization, Fordham Law Students for Reproductive Justice (FLSRJ), has been pushing for a clarification of Fordham's birth control policy.

"When there's a policy that effects 50 percent of the students that attend the University, we just want to make sure that that information is clear and available to students so there's no misconceptions," Emily Wolf, Fordham Law '13 and vice president of FLSRJ, said.

Online, one has to visit the Women's Health Care tab on the Student Health Services site to find an explicit statement on the policy. It is the only page that states the following:

"Neither contraceptives nor birth control are distributed or prescribed on premises as a standard practice."

"We prescribe birth control pills to students with specific medical reasons such as PCOS, acne, etc. with official documentation from doctors or through examination at [the] health center. Reasons other than contraceptive purposes," Kathleen M. Malara, director of Student Health Services, said.

Due to new government mandates about contraceptives, however, that policy may have to be expanded.

Last July, the nonpartisan Institute of Medicine, which had been reviewing the specifications of the Affordable Care Act (otherwise known as Obamacare) issued a report saying that birth control is a preventive medicine and should be free for all women.

By the first of August, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued a ruling requiring that insurance companies cover women's preventive services without co-pays or deductibles.

In addition to FDA-approved forms of birth control (and yes, that includes the morning-after pill), these preventive services include well-woman screenings, gestinal diabetes screenings, breast-feeding support and domestic violence screenings.

The biggest complication with the mandate, which was praised by most healthcare professionals, was the obvious contradiction with religious beliefs against contraception.

On Jan. 20, the HHS offered its solution: Religiously affiliated hospitals and schools have until Aug. 1, 2013 to provide the required healthcare plans covering contraceptives. (Churches and other houses of worship, however, are exempt.)

The response from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops was swift and overwhelmingly negative.

"To force American citizens to choose between violating their consciences and forging healthcare is literally unconscionable," Cardinal-designate Timothy M. Dolan, archbishop of New York, said in a statement.