Use of the contraceptive Pill increases the risk of depression in women by up to 130 per cent, according to new researcher.
A study in the Epidemiology and Psychiatric Sciences, journal published by Cambridge University Press, also found that the risk of developing a permanent problem with depression was highest among women who used the Pill from an early age.
The increased risk for depression was also high particularly in the first two years of taking the oral contraceptive.
The study involved examining data taken from birth to menopause of more than a quarter of a million women from the UK Biobank.
Researchers were able to identify how the use of the combined contraceptive Pill might have corresponded not only with the first diagnoses of depression but also when the users first experienced symptoms of depression.
They discovered that women who began to use Pills teenagers developed a 130 per cent higher incidence of depression symptoms.
In contrast, women who began to use the Pill in their 20s or older had a 92 per cent increased risk of depression.
Therese Johansson of Uppsala University, Sweden, an author of the study, said: “The powerful influence of contraceptive pills on teenagers can be ascribed to the hormonal changes caused by puberty.
“As women in that age group have already experienced substantial hormonal changes, they can be more receptive not only to hormonal changes but also to other life experiences.”
The study said that the risk of depression in adult women who stopped using the Pill declined after two years.
But they found that the risk of depression remained consistently high among women who began to use the Pill in their teenage years.
The study comes just months after scientists at the University of Oxford discovered that every type of hormonal contraception increases a woman’s risk of developing breast cancer.
Scientists have previously linked the combined contraceptive Pill – which is made up of oestrogen and progestogen – to a 20 per cent increase in developing the disease, while similar high rates have been identified in the coil and contraceptive implants.
The study by the Oxford researchers found, however, that even the new generation of hormonal contraceptives can be just as dangerous.
A team analysed data from more than 9,000 women aged between 20 and 49 who developed invasive breast cancer and compared their lifestyles to 18,000 closely-matched women who did not develop the disease.
They found that women who had used the progestogen-only Pill, the newest generation of oral contraceptives, also increased their risk of developing breast cancer by 20 to 30 per cent.
Once women stopped taking the Pill, the risk of developing the disease progressively declined, according to findings published in the journal Plos Medicine.
In 2020 about 3.2 million women in England were using the combined Pill and a similar number were using the progestogen-only Pill.
Besides the Pill, studies around the world have also shown abortion to be a causal link in the development of breast cancer.
Scientists have said the cancer was caused by high levels of oestradiol, a hormone which stimulates breast growth during pregnancy. The effects of the hormone are minimised in women who take their pregnancy to full term but it remains at dangerous levels in those who abort.
There has been an 80 per cent increase in the rate of breast cancer since 1971, at the same time as the number of abortions rose from an annual 18,000 to well over 200,000 a year.
St Paul included an appeal to scientists in his encyclical to identify ways to help married couples to regulate their fertility without separating the procreative and unitive aspects of the conjugal act.
Since then, a variety of methods of natural family planning, such as theBillings Ovulation Method, have been developed. None is contraceptive in its action but instead rely on accurately identifying the fertile days of a female reproductive cycle and abstaining from intercourse then to avoid pregnancy.
Most are free, environmentally-friendly, more effective than any contraceptive when used properly and devoid of all side effects and health risks.
Conversely, couples seeking to conceive a child can use the method to pinpoint the most suitable time to achieve a pregnancy.
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