New York Post: Birth Control Might Be Making Teens Depressed, by Mary Huhn

By Mary Huhn, NY Post, October 2, 2019

The pill might be bringing the blues to teenage girls.

According to a new study, 16-year-old girls taking oral contraceptives reported more crying, sleeping and eating problems than teens of the same age not using oral contraceptives.

The birth control pill first became widely available in 1960, and since its inception researchers have tried to figure out the pill’s effect on a woman’s moods.

“Ours is the first study of this scale to dive deep into the more subtle mood symptoms that occur much more commonly than a depression episode but impact quality of life and are worrying to girls, women and their families,” said co-author Hadine Joffe, MD, vice chair for research for the Brigham and Women’s Hospital Department of Psychiatry, in a statement.

Researchers at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, the University Medical Center Groningen (UMCG) and Leiden University Medical Center followed 1010 adolescent women ages 16 to 25 for nine years for the study, which was published in JAMA Psychiatry on Oct. 2. ….

Read more at  https://nypost.com/2019/10/02/birth-control-might-be-making-teens-depressed/amp/