Contraceptive Equity


Contraceptive Equity requires health insurance plans that cover prescription drugs to include coverage for contraceptives. Though most health insurance plans provide coverage for prescription drugs and devices, many deliberately exclude coverage for the most used: contraceptives. Because of this inequity, women spend 68% more in out-of-pocket health care costs than men.


Contraceptive Equity is about fairness, preventing gender discrimination, and access to basic health care.
6/29/09 - Governor Doyle Signed State Budget & Contraceptive Equity into Law!
On June 29, Governor Doyle signed the state budget and the 3 prevention first initiatives into law: Contraceptive Equity, Prescription Protection, and expansion of the Family Planning Waiver! Contraceptive Equity will go into effect on January 1, 2010.

As a Matter of Gender Equity, Prescription Drug Plans Must Include Contraceptives

  • Family planning information and services are basic health care for women during at least three decades of their lives.
  • Most women spend approximately 30 years trying to post-pone or avoid pregnancy.
  • 98% of women use at least one kind of contraceptive method during this time.
  • Contraceptive equity laws require insurance plans that cover prescription drug benefits to include federal food and drug (FDA) approved contraceptive drugs and devices in their benefit plans. 27 states already have such laws.
  • Excluding birth control coverage under prescription drug plans singles out women, because only women use prescription birth control.
  • Because of the lack of coverage, women spend 68% more in out-of-pocket health care costs than men.
  • Only 33% of the largest insurance plans include comprehensive coverage of contraceptives.
  • Historically, it has taken state laws to ensure that health insurance plans to cover women’s health issues. Advocates have secured insurance mandates in WI that require coverage of maternity and newborn care; coverage of mammograms and breast reconstruction surgery; and direct access to obstetricians and gynecologists.
  • 40% of women who are at risk for an unintended pregnancy say they have problems accessing birth control.
  • Policies that allow insurance plans to exclude contraception contribute to the U.S.’s high unintended pregnancy rates and the cycle of poverty that plagues primarily women and children.

Requiring Contraceptive Equity Will NOT Increase Employers’ Health Care Costs

  • In 1999, a federal law was passed requiring all federal employee health benefits plans to cover the cost of contraceptives. According to the Office of Personnel Management, which administers the federal programs, there has not been an increase in premium costs due to mandated contraceptive coverage (The National Women’s Law Center, 2001).
  • Investing in contraceptive services is extremely cost effective. For every public dollar spent on contraceptive care, state and local governments save $4.02 (The Guttmacher Institute, 2009).
  • The National Business Group on Health, an organization representing over 160 large national and multi-national employers, has estimated that failing to provide contraceptive coverage actually costs employers 15-17% more than providing the coverage (Promoting Healthy Pregnancies: Counseling and Contraception as the First Step; Family Health in Brief, 2000).