Tomi Lahren Is Wrong About Birth Control
Tomi Lahren thinks that without insurance, birth control is actually pretty cheap.
In an interview with Marie Claire, the former conservative talk show host - who in March was fired from her job at The Blaze TV after she said on The View she was pro-choice - said that she doesn't see why women can't pay for birth control out of their own pockets.
"I can't speak for every woman, but my birth control is covered by my insurance, and if it weren't covered, it would cost $9 a month," Lahren said. "I don't know a lot of women who can't afford $9 a month."
She continued: "I can understand that maybe there are some who can't afford that, but I just don't think birth control is so outrageously expensive that government funding for it is necessary."
Lahren may be able to afford birth control without insurance. But her sentiment - that birth control is totally affordable - is misleading. According to Bedsider, a nonprofit birth control support network, birth control pills can cost up to $113 per month without insurance. More effective forms of contraception, such as an IUD, can cost up to $858 at once (or about $14 a month over five years). That's a burden many women just can't afford to pay. Instead, studies show that women who can't afford contraception often turn to DIY forms of birth control - like pulling out - that aren't as effective.
The view that birth control is inexpensive is shared by at least one member of President Donald Trump's Cabinet, Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price. In 2012, then-Congressman Price argued against the Affordable Care Act's birth control coverage mandate and suggested that women could afford birth control without insurance.
“Bring me one woman who has been left behind. Bring me one," Price said of women who couldn't afford contraception, contending that the mandate is harmful because it quashes religious liberty. "There’s not one."
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