Clinics have seen a surge in vasectomy since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last year. Photo: Barbara J. Perenick/The Columbus Dispatch via AP.
When the US Supreme Court overturned the historic decision of Roe v. Wade, which made abortion a state-protected right, it sparked a fierce debate about women's freedom and led to a complete ban on the procedure in 13 states.
Supporters on both sides predicted just such an outcome, but there was another unexpected side effect. What is happening in America right now is what urologist Esgar Guarin of the SimpleVas clinic in Iowa calls the “vasectomy revolution.”
Across the country, more and more men are opting for surgery because they no longer have a fallback.< /p>Abortion banned in more than a dozen US states
In the first 48 hours after Roe v. Wade was canceled, our clinic increased traffic to our website by 300 percent. Then the number of vasectomies we do in the clinic increased by 100%,” says Guarin.
The full boom lasted four months, but even today the number of vasectomy surgeries in the clinic is still growing. by 50% from pre-Supreme Court levels.
If this surge continues, it will likely have long-term consequences—and not just for the men involved. This could further exacerbate the declining US birth rate, which is already jeopardizing the long-term growth of the world's largest economy.
“Since 2008, the birth rate has plummeted,” says Alison Gemmil, a demographer at Johns Hopkins University.
Women give birth to children at an older age.
“We expected this downturn because of the great recession, because when the economy is bad, people don't have children. But then the economy picked up and the birth rate continued to decline,” says Gemmil.
— After the pandemic, it seems that something has changed in people's ideas about children.
«It's no longer associated only with traditional indicators of whether the economy is doing well or badly.»
Guarín also runs a mobile clinic, «a big box of sperm printed across it and a big sign on the back that says 'horn if you've had a vasectomy'.»
He travels 700 miles every month. around Iowa. In November, he traveled to a number of family planning centers between Iowa and Missouri — places where abortions used to be done — to perform 110 free vasectomies.
“They relied on contraceptives that their partners were using. They came in and said something like: «I'm doing this because I can't count on an abortion, which was my last option,» says Guarin.
No official data yet, but widespread unconfirmed data shows that American men are rushing to get vasectomy.
For the week in May 2022 when the decision to dismiss Roe v. Wade was leaked, Google Trends data shows searches for «vasectomy» in the US rose by 115%. In the week the decision was officially announced, search queries were up 285% compared to the same period a year earlier.
Vasectomy searches have skyrocketed
It is clear that demand continues. Search queries in April this year increased by 25% compared to pre-pandemic levels.
For a study published in the International Journal of Impotence, a team of urologists at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio tracked vasectomy billing data from 2018 to now at a large Midwestern healthcare organization that operates 13 community hospitals in urban and rural areas. areas.
Vasectomy surged when the Roe v. Wade decision was leaked and then skyrocketed after it was officially announced. By August 2022, the healthcare organization was performing 218 procedures per month. This is more than double the monthly rate of 2018.
Those numbers include patients who started consultations before the ruling, but the decision likely spurred them into scheduling the procedure, the report said. The trend is expected to continue. They noted a 35% year-on-year increase in consultation requests and a 22% increase in consultations.
Importantly, the researchers reported a major demographic shift among men who sought the procedure.
< p>Previously, men who had vasectomy were older and already had children. Today, those who receive clipping are younger and much more likely to be childless.
“Young men, especially those under 30, as well as childless men, were significantly more likely to seek counseling after Dobbs compared to the previous reproductive legal climate.” ”, the report says.
“The results show that men are interested in maintaining reproductive autonomy for themselves and their partners.”
Since Roe v. Wade was overturned, the average age of men who have had vasectomy has dropped from 38 to 35. Nearly a quarter were under 30 compared to one in 10 in 2021. The 2022 cohort was also less likely to be married. The proportion of those who have not yet had children has doubled from one in 12 to one in six.
«The dismissal of Roe v. Wade in June 2022 changed the way family planning is done for male partners,» says in the report. .
«The immediacy with which this change has been seen indicates that the post-Dobbs generation has already been significantly affected by the legal climate, and the effects of this decision on the population will continue to play out differently in the coming decades.» ;
A surge in vasectomy threatens to deepen America's broader fertility decline.
Falling fertility
In 2021, the number of births was the third highest in 40 years. If the 2007 birth rate had held up after the financial crisis, 8.6 million more children would have been born in America by 2021, says Kenneth Johnson, professor of sociology and senior demographer at the Carsey School.
There is also a secondary vasectomy revolution that is separate from Rowe vs. Wade. According to Mark Goldstein, professor and director of male reproductive medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York, the number of consultations at his New York clinic has doubled in the past six months.
Abortion is allowed here. But men have a different motivation.
“What I’m seeing is very similar to what we saw during the great recession of 2008,” he says.
it was clearly related to the economy, people felt that they simply could not afford to have more children.
“The patients who come to me today are almost all couples who have decided that this is not the world in who they want to bring the kids,” says Goldstein. Half say they can't afford it, he adds. Others cite climate change.
“I see men in their early 30s who have never had children but decide this is not a world they would ever want to bring children into.” ', says Goldstein. .
Goldstein himself uses a technique known as a no-scalpel vasectomy. “I brought it from China,” says Goldstein.
This method was developed during the era of the one-child policy, an era that created a demographic time bomb.
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