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Religion is not a barrier to family planning

Shareen Joshi explains that faith-based organizations around the world are working with governments and secular institutions to promote birth control.
  1. Shareen Joshi

    1. Shareen Joshi is an economist at Georgetown University in Washington DC.

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Public policy debates in the United States might suggest that faith and family planning are fundamentally incompatible. Some religious writers object to contraception on the grounds that it can “damage or destroy the image of God in other human beings” and that the idea of using contraception is “associated with increased likelihood of acceptance of abortion”1.

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Nature 588, S165 (2020)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-020-03531-7

This article is part of Nature Outlook: Reproductive health, an editorially independent supplement produced with the financial support of third parties. About this content.

References

  1. Wubbenhorst, M. C. & Wubbenhorst, J. K. Dignitas 24, 11–21 (2017).

  2. Joshi, S. & Schultz, T. P. Demography 50, 149–180 (2013).

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  3. Huber, D., Saeedi, N. & Samadi, A. K. Bull. World Health Org. 88, 227–231 (2010).

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