A New Cause
Mood:  on fire
Topic: Musings
Last night, I watched Primetime Live because I saw that they were going to be talking about the birth control patch, which I happen to use. When I saw the segment, I was appalled. It was a very sensationalized and misleading "news" story.

Basically, the segment was explaining that the patch can have dangerous (though rare) side effects such as blood clots, heart attack or stroke. These are actually side effects that the patch shares with all hormonal contraceptive methods, pill included. However, the show only pointed that out once and did not repeat it. Instead, they chose to focus almost exclusively on the patch even though they presented no evidence to show that the patch is any more dangerous than other hormonal contraceptives. This is irresponsible journalism. Women who are using the birth control pill might get a false sense of security because they focused almost solely on the patch in the segment. Also, they failed to mention that certain behaviors, such as smoking, increase the risk of these dangerous side effects. This is important information that was not presented because of some strange bias that Primetime has against the patch.

I encourage people to write to Primetime and ask that they correct their story on the air. Making women afraid of hormonal contraceptives to sell a story is just plain dirty. Tell Primtetime that if they're going to present health information, they should do so in a balanced and responsible way. A transcript of the show can be found on Primetime's Website.