I was surprised to see that emergency birth control is a fairly new concept. Seems like the theory was around since the 70s, but dedicated kits didn’t become a thing until the 2000s.

7 comments

  1. I’m not woman, but OTC emergency contraception came to Norway in october 2000 as the second country in the world. It was quite an improvent in speed since it took long for us to get the birth control pill (1967, 7 years after the US).

  2. Not a woman, but my GF and I needed „la pilule du lendemain“ when we were in France on a school trip. It was available in pharmacies in 1999 and WITHOUT PRESCRIPTION and for FREE!

    We were able to cover our literal FU, which had not been possible if she would have had to get a prescription first.

  3. I’m not a woman, but I’m a pharmacist. I don’t know when exactly those appeared in Poland, but all I know is that in 2014 they were prescription-only, in 2015 they were available as OTC drugs, but yet again in 2017 they became prescription-only to this day. “Thanks to” the MPs from the ruling party. We’re one of only few European countries (like Hungary, who would have thought) that have prescription-only emergency contraception and I’m f…ing FUMING.

    Poland is a very weird country. EMERGENCY contraception? Only for prescription, because the backwards conservative government and catholic fanatics think that it’s abortifacient (WTF). Tablets for erectile dysfunction? Yes, of course, 25 mg or 50 mg sildenafil OTC, because why not. And apparently tadalafil will be available as OTC too. This is outrageous, absolutely unacceptable.

  4. Huh, I’ve never taken but a friend did and it was definetly early months of 2004. But we all knew it for some time already. I think soon after that you had to be prescribed the morning-after pill. Cause she went to a pharmacy and just bought it.

  5. I think in the early 2000s, but you needed a medical prescription, i remember magazines for teen girls explaining how it worked, where to find a prescription (in every doctor’s clinic, public hospital and family clinic), how to buy it, adding that doctor and pharmacists are legally bound to keep it secret and that it doesn’t replace proper contraception. Since 2009, you can buy it without a prescription.

    I’m glad to say that there isn’t much stigma around it, but it may be because a lot of elderly folks barely know what it is.

  7. In Finland it became available without prescription in 2002. I was in high school back then and still remember when a friend of mine had to visit ER in 2001 to get a prescription. At first there was an age limit of 15 for OTC purchase, but that limit was removed in 2015.

Leave a Reply
You May Also Like