A Shot in the Arm for Contraception Policy: Using Norplant to Reduce Teenage Pregnancy in New Zealand

Abstract

The history of western civilisation has been marked by institutional efforts to regulate female sexuality. This form of control over women has often centred around access to, and use of, contraception. In 19th century America, for instance, a woman's use of contraception was often punished by clitoridectomy, ovariectomy, or even hysterectomy, while more recently unmarried women in Canada were legally denied access to contraceptives until 1969.2 In the 1990s, however, policy on the non-use of contraception has undergone a radical shift, particularly as regards teenage women. This change draws on the fact that, in addition to the personal costs contingent on adolescent pregnancy, very young mothers will often require continuing public support. In order to reduce the number of unplanned teenage pregnancies, new ways of regulating female sexuality are once again being examined. The option which has been widely hailed as offering the most promising means to this end is Norplant-the Population Council's trademark name for a hormonal contraceptive placed under a woman's skin, which offers up to 5 years protection from unwanted conception.3 3 This paper locates Norplant as a method of fertility control whose range of potential applications raises important issues of public policy. Strategies to reduce teenage pregnancies which involve the use of Norplant play upon unrealistic optimism and unfounded fears-sentiments which are found in the interaction between socio-cultural values, biomedical technologies, and political institutions. The complexity of this matrix demands that we cannot characterise Norplant along a simplistic good/bad dichotomy. In unpacking the nature of this ambiguity, a case will be mounted for the careful introduction of Norplant to New ' Work on this article was completed while the author was employed at the Crown Law Office, Wellington. The views expressed in the article are, of course, the author's alone, and should not be taken to represent those of the Crown Law Office. 2 See G.