Birth control packaging: Plastic waste that we can all learn from

An astonishing amount of women takes the pill

The “pill” I refer to is any oral contraceptive medication that alters female users’ hormones and fertility. I’m proud to take it, and my female friends proudly take it, either for birth control, PMDD, or other hormonal concerns. The birth control pill is, relatively, a great thing. An estimated 100 million women around the world take the pill (http://www.contraceptivetechnology.com/table.html), which is astounding considering the other forms of contraception a female can use in her sex life: male condoms, female condoms, diaphragms, contraceptive sponges, spermicide… all this madness.

 Currently mainstream women most so prefer the pill, and a typical conversation in the college dorm room is the comparison of which brands female friends are using (I encourage male friends and male partners into these talks too, as there is absolutely no need for males’ uninvolvement in the pill talks) And quite often, girls compare the hilarious packaging of their pills. The topic of this post: excessive birth control packaging.

 But, first, I’ll address the inquiry that inspired this post: Is the particularly soft plastic of birth control packaging giving me large doses of BPA?

(Refer to my post from Feb. 12 for an explanation of the BPA toxin) Well, I’ve done some sporadic online investigating over these months and have found, really, little information on this issue. It’s an important matter for scientists to investigate: with the pill already hyping females’ hormones, the addition of BPA, a synthetic form of estrogen, might significantly alter the intended effects of the pill. Maybe your girlfriend’s appetite was heightened not from the pill, but from the BPA’s bad interaction with the pill. Maybe we could have avoided our exponentially worse menstruation cramps while taking the pill, ladies. Researchers, please visit this inquiry in your labs. I might be getting angry without needing to.

Look at pill packaging

It’s an insane amount of plastic that producers add to the pill, allegedly to remind women to take their pill at the same time every day. PBS compiled a great history of pill packaging and reports:

The first prescription drug for healthy patients, the Pill neither treated nor prevented disease. Instead, taken daily, it prevented pregnancy by changing the hormonal balance in women's bodies. The Pill far surpassed other contraceptive methods, except abstinence, in effectiveness. All a woman had to do was remember to take it every day. Pill packages quickly evolved to remind women to take their daily doses.

The site also features images from the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, showing the evolution of this incredibly excessive packaging. Click this link for all the pictures, it’s worth looking at: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/pill/gallery/index.html

Pill packaging is not at all sustainable

Pill users usually don’t recycle all this plastic, which includes the packets, the cases, everything. I never before stopped to consider throwing my pill materials into the recycling bin in my apartment, along with papers, old gladware, beer bottles, etc. No pill packets to be seen. Well, this is an incredible waste that ends up in landfills.

Sustainableday.com’s blogger and reporter “Stiven” comments:

Just yesterday I went into a pharmacy to buy: chapstick, floss, and pick up my wife's birth control…The birth control pills are really out of hand, they come in: a paper bag with the receipt, copy of the prescription and a coupon flier stapled to the outside of the bag, inside you find a colorful heavy cardboard box containing another plastic and foil dispenser, a not so small manual describing use, and a separate fuzzy purple plastic little booklet caring case. I felt incredibly guilty as I threw all this excess packaging "away" in the garbage right outside the store... All I wanted was healthy teeth, unchaped lips, and birth control but we can't have any of that without senseless pollution these days. We need packaging reform! (http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/005634.html)

 Sing it, homie. We do need packaging reform, especially with health products. Go figure. Unhealthy human, unhealthy Earth.

 Sustainable Life guest blogger Anne Morgan writes about her move from the U.S. to Sweden. She was pleasantly surprised by her much-less-humiliating birth control, more discreetly packaged:

The reasonably-packaged Swedish birth control came in a blister pack with an unassuming, reusable, recyclable cardboard sheath. I received four sheaths for the year’s supply. In sharp contrast, my new American birth control is dispensed via a giant blister pack with a completely superfluous pink plastic case thingie and a pink vinyl sheath. I received 12 cases and sheaths for the year’s supply because heaven forbid we reuse the outrageous over-packaging.

 After I use up my prescription I’ll be switching to something with a smaller footprint that I’m less embarrassed to keep on my nightstand. And (my old pill company) will be receiving a letter from me accompanied by my year’s supply of birth control packaging. I’ll be damned if it’s going to MY landfill!  (http://michellemckay.typepad.com/sustainablelife/2007/10/overpacking-bir.html)

And the rest of us women can relate.

What can we do?

We should be writing to our pill providers. Women can vow to set our cell phone alarms to remind us instead of Ortho Tri Cyclen Low’s giant pink bubble case. Men can vow to remind their female partners when it’s that hour to get the Purple Yazmin out. Or do as I have, vowing to reuse the same blue Yaz slip for all future pill packs; don’t give me another one! Women can’t responsibly stop taking the pill, but producers must responsibly stop overpackaging their birth control pills.