birth control
birth control
birth control
birth′ control`
n.
| Noun | 1. |  birth control - limiting the number of children born |
| 单词 | birth control | |||
| 释义 | birth controlbirth controlbirth controlbirth′ control`n.
birth(bəːθ) nounbirth control→ 节育zhCNbirth controlbirth control,practice of contraception for the purpose of limiting reproduction.Methods of Birth ControlMale birth control methods include withdrawal of the male before ejaculation (the oldest contraceptive technique) and use of the condom, a rubber sheath covering the penis. The condom, because of its use as a protection against sexually transmitted diseases, including AIDSAIDS Contraceptive methods for women include the rhythm method—abstinence around the most likely time of ovulation—and precoital insertion into the vagina of substances (creams, foams, jellies, or suppositories) containing spermicidal chemicals. The use of a diaphragm, a rubber cup-shaped device inserted before intercourse, prevents sperm from reaching the uterine cervix; it is usually used with a spermicide. Contraceptive sponges, which are impregnated with a spermicide, also are inserted into the vagina before intercourse and work primarily by acting as a barrier to the sperm. Intrauterine devices, or IUDs, are variously shaped small objects inserted by a doctor into the uterus; they apparently act by creating a uterine environment hostile either to sperm or to the fertilized egg. The birth control pill, an oral contraceptive, involves a hormonal method in which estrogen and progestins (progesteronelike substances) are taken cyclically for 21 or 84 days, followed by 7 days of inactive or no pills. The elevated levels of hormones in the blood suppress production of the pituitary hormones (luteinizing hormone and follicle-stimulating hormone) that would ordinarily cause ovulation. An oral contraceptive formulation that utilizes no inactive pills and is taken every day (and completely suppresses menstruation) also exists. Estrogen and progestins may also be delivered through the weekly use of a contraceptive skin patch or the monthly use of a vaginal ring (a flexible plastic ring inserted in the vagina); both slowly release the hormones they contain. Although used primarily for birth control, some oral contraceptives are also prescribed to regulate the menstrual cycle, to relieve symptoms of endometriosis, to treat acne, and for other reasons. Sterilization of the female, often but not always performed during a Cesarean section or shortly after childbirth, consists of cutting or tying both Fallopian tubes, the vessels that carry the egg cells from the ovaries to the uterus. In male sterilization (vasectomyvasectomy, No contraceptive yet devised is at once simple, acceptable, safe, effective, and reversible. Some, such as the diaphragm, condom, and chemical and rhythm methods, require high motivation by users. The pill, which must be taken daily, sometimes induces undesirable side effects, such as nausea, headache, weight gain, and increased tendency to develop blood clots. Use of the pill is also associated with a higher risk of breast and cervical cancer—but a lower risk of cancer of the ovaries and endometrium, benign breast cysts, premenstrual syndrome, and iron-deficiency anemia. The IUDs, although requiring no personal effort or motivation, are often not tolerated or are expelled, and they sometimes, particularly if poorly designed, cause uterine infection, septic abortion, and other problems. If birth control fails (or is not used), doctors may prescribe several large doses of certain oral contraceptives as "morning after" pills or emergency contraceptives; the high level of hormones can inhibit the establishment of pregnancy even if fertilization has taken place. Levonorgestrel, a progestin marketed under the tradename Plan B, is used an emergency contraceptive, and may be effective up to 3 days after sexual intercourse. Approved for use in the United States in 1999, it was made available over-the-counter for women 18 years or older in 2006. Ulipristal acetate, a progesterone agonist/antagonist sold under the tradename ella, was approved as an emergency contraceptive in 2010; it may be effective for up to 5 days after intercourse. Mifepristone, or RU-486, the so-called abortion pill, is effective within seven weeks after conception and requires close medical supervision. It was first approved in Europe and was tested in the mid-1990s in United States, where it was approved in 2000. Another experimental technique is immunization against human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG), a hormone secreted by a developing fertilized egg that stimulates production of progesterone by the ovary; the effect of the anti-HCG antibody would be to inactivate HCG and thereby induce menstruation even if fertilization occurred. See also abortionabortion, History of the Birth Control MovementAlthough contraceptive techniques had been known in ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome, the modern movement for birth control began in Great Britain, where the writings of Thomas Robert MalthusMalthus, Thomas Robert In 1878 the first birth control clinic was founded in Amsterdam by Aletta Jacobs. The first U.S. birth control clinic, opened (1916) by Margaret SangerSanger, Margaret Higgins, Sanger also helped organize (1917) the National Birth Control League in the United States; in 1921 it became the American Birth Control League, and in 1942 the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. Meanwhile, in 1918 an American judge ruled that contraceptive devices were legal as instruments for the prevention of disease, and the federal law prohibiting dissemination of contraceptive information through the mails was modified in 1936. Throughout the 1940s and 50s, birth control advocates were engaged in numerous legal suits. In 1965 the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the one remaining state law (in Connecticut) prohibiting the use of contraceptives. The federal government began to take a more active part in the birth control movement in 1967, when 6% of the funds allotted to the Child Health Act was set aside for family planning; in 1970, the Family Planning Services and Population Act established separate funds for birth control. Birth control and sex education in schools continue to be emotional issues in the United States, where adolescent sexual activity and pregnancy rates are high and bring with them increased risks of sexually transmitted diseasessexually transmitted disease Birth control on the international level is led by the International Planned Parenthood Federation, founded in 1952, with members in 134 countries by 1995. Sweden was one of the first countries to provide government assistance for birth control, which it did as early as the 1930s. Two of the more successful birth control programs have been in Japan, where the birthrate has been dramatically reduced, and—more controversially—in China, where the government has a "one family, one child" policy and local authorities have typically intimated women pregnant into aborting a second pregnancy. Several of the so-called underpopulated nations, however, have a stated policy of encouraging an increased birthrate, e.g., Argentina, and concern over declining populations has increased in recent years in certain Western European countries and Russia. Among religious bodies, the Roman Catholic Church has provided the main opposition to the birth control movement; popes Paul VI and John Paul II reaffirmed this stance in encyclicals. BibliographySee G. J. Hardin, Birth Control (1970); L. Lader Breeding Ourselves to Death (1971) and The Margaret Sanger Story (1955, repr. 1975); C. Djerassi, The Politics of Contraception (1981); E. Jones, Pregnancy, Contraception, and Family Planning Services in Industrialized Countries (1989); L. V. Marks, Sexual Chemistry: A History of the Contraceptive Pill (2001); A. Tone, Devices and Desires: A History of Contraceptives in America (2001). birth control[bərth kən′trōl]birth controlbirth[berth]control[kon-trōl´]birth con·trolbirth controlbirth controlA generic term for the physical, chronological and hormonal manoeuvres used to prevent pregnancy.birth con·trol(bĭrth kŏn-trōl')birth controlA euphemism for CONTRACEPTION. Strictly speaking, the term also includes celibacy, sexual continence, sterilization, castration and abortion.birth controlany method used to limit the size of the human population, which usually involves the prevention of fertilization of the ovum by the sperm but can also include abortion of the foetus. Behavioural methods include
Many countries have government-sponsored birth control programmes, initiated in an attempt to control the rapidly increasing human population. For example, China not only encourages one child per family but is also attempting to produce a longer period between generations (over 25 years) by favouring marriages at a late date. birth con·trol(bĭrth kŏn-trōl')Patient discussion about birth controlQ. Does it exist a Birth Control Shot for men? Q. BIRTH CONTROL how many types are there? Q. how long after i have stop taking birth control pills can i get pregnant? Birth ControlBirth ControlA measure or measures undertaken to prevent conception. In the 1800s, temperance unions and anti-vice societies headed efforts to prohibit birth control in the United States. Anthony Comstock, the secretary of the Society for the Suppression of Vice, advocated a highly influential law passed by Congress in 1873. It was titled the Act for the Suppression of Trade in, and Circulation of Obscene Literature and Articles of Immoral Use, but known popularly as the comstock law or Comstock Act (18 U.S.C.A. § 1416-62 [1964]; 19 U.S.C.A. § 1305 [1964]). The Comstock Act prohibited the use of the mail system to transmit obscene materials or articles addressing or for use in the prevention of conception, including information on birth control methods or birth control devices themselves. Soon after the federal government passed the Comstock Act, over half of the states passed similar laws. All but two of the rest of the states already had laws banning the sale, distribution, or advertising of contraceptives. Connecticut had a law that prohibited even the use of contraceptives; it was passed with little or no consideration for its enforceability. Despite popular opposition, birth control had its advocates, including margaret sanger. In 1916, Sanger opened in New York City the first birth control clinic in the United States. For doing so, she and her sister Ethel Byrne, who worked with her, were prosecuted under the state's version of the Comstock law (People v. Byrne, 99 Misc. 1, 163 N.Y.S. 682 [1917]; People v. Sanger, 179 A.D. 939, 166 N.Y.S. 1107 [1917]). Both were convicted and sentenced to thirty days in a workhouse. After serving her sentence, Sanger continued to attack the Comstock Act. She established the National Committee for Federal Legislation for Birth Control, headquartered in Washington, D.C., and proposed the "doctor's bill." This bill advocated change in the government's policy toward birth control, citing the numerous instances in which women had died owing to illegal abortions and unwanted pregnancies. The bill was defeated, due, in part, to opposition from the Catholic Church and other religious groups. But when the issue of Sanger's sending birth control devices through the mail to a doctor was pressed in United States v. One Package, 13 F. Supp. 334 (S.D.N.Y. 1936), the court ruled that the Comstock Act was not concerned with preventing distribution of items that might save the life or promote the well-being of a doctor's patients. Sanger had sought to challenge the Comstock Act by breaking it and sending contraception in the mail. Her efforts were victorious and the exception was made. The doctor to whom Sanger had sent the device was granted its possession. Sanger furthered her role in reforming attitudes toward birth control by founding the Planned Parenthood Federation of America in 1942. Planned Parenthood merged previously existing birth control federations and promoted a range of birth control options. In the 1950s, Sanger went on to support the work of Dr. Gregory Pincus, whose research eventually produced the revolutionary birth control pill. By the 1960s, partly as a result of Sanger's efforts, popular and legal attitudes toward birth control began to change. The case of griswold v. connecticut, 381 U.S. 479, 85 S. Ct. 1678, 14 L. Ed. 2d 510 (1965), loosened the restrictions of the Comstock Act. When the Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut opened in 1961, its executive director, Estelle Griswold, faced charges of violating Connecticut's ban on the use of contraceptives (Conn. Gen. Stat. Ann. §§ 53-32, 54-196 [1958]). A divided Supreme Court overturned Griswold's conviction with a ground-breaking opinion that established a constitutional right to marital privacy. The Court threw out the underlying Connecticut statute, which prohibited both using contraception and assisting or counseling others in its use. The majority opinion, authored by Justice william o. douglas, looked briefly at a series of prior cases in which the Court had found rights not specifically enumerated in the Constitution—for example, the right of freedom of association, which the Court has said is protected by the First Amendment, even though that phrase is not used there (NAACP v. Alabama, 357 U.S. 449, 78 S. Ct. 1163, 2 L. Ed. 2d 1488 [1958]). Douglas concluded that various guarantees contained in the Bill of Rights' Amendments One, Three, Four, Five, Nine, along with Amendment Fourteen, create "zones of privacy," which include a right of marital privacy. The Connecticut statute, which could allow police officers to search a marital bedroom for evidence of contraception, was held unconstitutional; the government did not have a right to make such intrusions into the marital relationship. The other branches of the government followed the Court's lead. President lyndon b. johnson endorsed public funding for family planning services in 1966, and the federal government began to subsidize birth control services for low-income families. In 1970 President richard m. nixon signed the Family Planning Services and Population Research Act (42 U.S.C.A. § 201 et seq.). This act supported activities related to population research and family planning. More and more, the Comstock Act came to be seen as part of a former era, until, in 1971, the essential components of it were repealed. But this repeal was not necessarily followed in all the states. In the 1972 case of Eisenstad v. Baird, 405 U.S. 438, 92 S. Ct. 1029, 31 L. Ed. 2d 349, the Court struck down a Massachusetts law still on the books that allowed distribution of contraceptives to married couples only. The Court held that the Massachusetts law denied single persons Equal Protection, in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. In the 1977 case of Carey v. Population Services International, 431 U.S. 678, 97 S. Ct. 2010, 52 L. Ed. 2d 675, the Supreme Court continued to expand constitutional protections in the area of birth control. The Court imposed a strict standard of review for a New York law that it labeled "defective." The law had prohibited anyone but physicians from distributing contraceptives to minors under sixteen years of age. The law had also prohibited anyone but licensed pharmacists from distributing contraceptives to persons over sixteen. Carey allowed makers of contraceptives more freedom to distribute and sell their products to teens. Throughout the 1990s, cases were brought in a number of jurisdictions in which parents sought to prohibit the distribution of condoms and other forms of birth control in schools to unemancipated minor students without the consent of a parent or guardian. Although some jurisdictions held that such birth control distribution programs violated the parents' due process rights, other jurisdictions upheld the privacy rights of such minors and found the programs to be constitutional. More controversy arose after women gained access to RU-486, the so-called "morning-after" pill and later generations of emergency contraceptives, which are high-dosage birth control pills designed to be taken shortly after unprotected intercourse has taken place. Emergency contraception continues to be opposed by antiabortion groups on the ground that it is another form of abortion. Since 2000, the election of Republican majorities in various state legislatures has strengthened the position of groups opposing abortion and reproductive rights. In addition to continuing to battle for the right to require parental consent for contraceptive services to minors both in schools and community health clinics, a number of conservative groups support "abstinence-only" sexuality education classes in schools. While some proponents want to make such classes optional and are willing to have them taught alongside traditional courses that discuss various methods of birth control, other adherents seek to have these classes taught in place of the traditional courses. President george w. bush's election in 2000 as well as the Republican gains in the House in 2002, further strengthened the efforts of those who seek to restrict access to birth control education and methods. Further readingsBacigal, Ronald J. 1990. The Limits of Litigation—The Dalkon Shield Controversy. Durham, N.C.: Carolina Academic Press. Hoff-Wilson, Joan. 1991. Gender and Injustice: A Legal History of U.S. Women. New York: New York Univ. Press. McCann, Carole R. 1994. Birth Control Politics in the United States, 1916–1945. Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press. McLaren, Angus. 1990. A History of Contraception from Antiquity to the Present. Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell. Planned Parenthood. Available online at <www.plannedparenthood.org> (accessed June 1, 2003). Solinger, Rickie. 2000. Wake Up Little Susie: Single Pregnancy and Race before Roe v. Wade. New York: Routledge. Cross-referencesFamily Law; Griswold v. Connecticut (Appendix, Primary Document); Parent and Child; Privacy; Reproduction; Schools and School Districts. birth control
Synonyms for birth control
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