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Dont take contraception sitting down

There is a tragic story of a 41 year old Wellington women, a Miss Pearce, who died when a blot clot moved to her lungs. But it was also a little strange. Twice, the story mentioned that she was taking a contraceptive pill that produced 'thickening' of the blood as a side effect. Would it be fair to say that this becomes a known risk? And perhaps women might want to consider not using the pill?

That was the strange part. The article blamed 'office work' on the death, and sitting for long hours.

Oh sure, she was taking a drug that produced a dangerous blood condition.

But it was the sitting down that did her in.

Now, I have no doubt that the office work didn't help matters, and getting up and walking around periodically is a good idea. But so is considering the impact of the drugs you take. The article noted that Miss Pearce was a part time student at Victoria University. That's about a 20 minute walk from where she worked, up a fairly steep hill - a good work out. I wonder if she drove?

The article also noted that a flight to Brisbane at some earlier point probably created or accentuated the deep vein thrombosis that led to her demise.

Oh, and the contraceptive pill with the blood thickening side effects.

From this tragedy, a Professor who has written a paper on the dangers of sedentary office work is wheeled in with the parents to promote the danger of sitting for long periods. But no-one has thought to promote the dangers of the contraceptive pill.

It very much seems to be a case of 'right, given you are going to be taking this dangerous pill (and what alternative do you have?), to avoid dying, for goodness sake, don't do this sitting down'

I find that strange.

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Comments

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. Actually, this argument was lost 40 years ago when NZ Catholic women became the worlds highest users of the pill, and today's Italy's Catholic women have the lowest birthrate in Europe.

    In the US, young, educated Black women are on the Pill because the young Black males aren't up to their potential mates education, income or morals.

    In all these cases, society hasn't been able to provide economic incentives to persuade young women to have babies.. and the obvious has occurred.

    The answer is quite straightforward; if you want babies you have to make it worthwhile to women.

    In the meantime, be pathetically grateful to Maori women who have babies and at least keep us up in the sustainable category.

    JC

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  3. An item here that may be of interest.
    "The only way to be really green is not to have children"
    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=481967&in_page_id=1770

    (still trying to work out how to post links properly)

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  4. This connection between the Pill and blood clots has been known for years and years; it will come up in the media from time to time and talked about as if it is a new idea, but it's not new. You only have to do a search on Google and it all comes up.

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  5. Far more women die giving birth than from this known side affect of the pill. So by your logic women are safer taking the pill than giving birth and should be advised against it. Or alternatively, if the pill was banned as I assume you would like, life expectancy among women would decrease as more women died giving birth.

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  6. no-one has thought to promote the dangers of the contraceptive pill

    Except of course the media (including the piece you link to), the MoH and the every doctor that prescribes the pill. Nice try.

    FWIW about 20 in 100 000 people taking the 'worst' pill will develop DVT - unless you have other risk factors (which your doctor will talk to you about) it's probably not a major concern

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  7. Agreed - my wife started taking the pill in 1980 and got plenty of warning from the doc about the relative level of risk involved in messing with your hormones. There were also regular stories about it in the media, sufficient enough for her to decide she wasn't going to use it longer than 5 years. No medical and media sales job going on so far as I could see.

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  8. Amazing the interpretations assumed from my post. I'm not advising women don't take the pill - I just found the story interesting in the way the focus was on office work as the 'silent killer'.

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  9. Ah yes. Office work is indeed the silent killer as there is no way that one of the pillars of modern Western Civilisation (the pill) is optional. Remember that whacky professor from down south that wanted the pill in everyone's water supply? I'm sure if that ever happened, the number of deaths attributed to office work would rise.

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  10. David - sorry I wasn't clear. My impression was that no-one in the article was promoting the dangers of the pill - sure they fessed up to the fact that this was 'a factor' in the death but the article was all about (to repeat myself) the 'Silent Killer' being work which involved sitting for long periods of time.

    The least the article could have done to earn some credentials on acknowledging the link between the pill and sitting down was to discuss the combination of these two factors (and perhaps the air travel being a third factor). It may have made taxi drivers (who are mostly male) feel a little better :-)

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  11. See - Lucyna has the sense of this. And now, in reading that, I'm wondering if male taxi drivers would be safe after all.

    I can see the need for a new bottled water product - "Man Water".

    The sales pitch could be: "100% water and nothing else. Because men don't need nothing else."

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  12. Yeah, but I have an advantage. I've never used the contraceptive pill, nor wanted a loved one to use it, so I don't have an emotional attachment to it.

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  13. Far more women die giving birth than from this known side affect of the pill.

    Never heard that one before....
    Sounds a bit made up to me.

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  14. Ah yes, the whole "birth is more dangerous" line.

    Blazingly obvious that that's comparing apples with oranges but it does seem to fool enough people..

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  15. Scrubone - the effects on coagulation during pregnancy are far greater than those caused by the contraceptive pill. (Apple with apple).

    Add to this the dangers of pregnancy - haemorrhage, suicide, eclampsia, amniotic fluid embolism, etc - one would have to say that taking the pill to prevent pregnancy is beneficial. (Apple with Orange).

    Of course abstainance is safer. (Can't even begin to fool any one with that).

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  16. Add to this the dangers of pregnancy - suicide ..

    A lot of living people also face this danger, even when not pregnant :-|

    And for the foetus, abortion has to figure as a big danger...

    Of course, life is a sexually transmitted terminal disease...

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