The historic Roe v. Wade decision, which had made abortion a federally protected right, was overruled by the US Supreme Court, sparking a vigorous discussion over women’s rights that resulted in the complete outlawing of the operation in 13 states. Both sides’ campaigners had anticipated exactly such a result, but there was a second unanticipated consequence.
A “vasectomy revolution” is currently taking place in America, according to urologist Esgar Guarn of the SimpleVas clinic in Iowa.
Because they have no other options left, more and more men nationwide are deciding to get the procedure.“Within the first 48 hours of the overturning of Roe v Wade, our clinic saw a 300 percent increase in the traffic to our website. Then we had a 100 percent increase in the number of vasectomies that we do in the clinic,” Guarín says.
This rise could have long-term effects if it continues, and not just for the men involved
The boom’s peak intensity lasted for four months, but even now, the number of vasectomy procedures performed at the clinic is still 50 percent more than it was before the Supreme Court’s ruling. This rise could have long-term effects if it continues, and not just for the men involved. It might worsen the US birth rate fall, which is already endangering long-term growth in the largest economy in the world.
“The birth rate has fallen pretty dramatically since 2008,” says Alison Gemmil, a demographer at Johns Hopkins University. Women are having children at older ages. “We expected this decline because of the great recession because when the economy is bad, people don’t have children. But then the economy got better and the birth rate kept declining,” says Gemmil.
“Since the pandemic, it just seems like there is something different that is changing people’s ideas about having children. “It is not just linked to the traditional indicators of whether the economy is doing good or bad anymore.” Guarín also operates a mobile clinic, “a big box with sperm printed across itself and a big sign on the back that says ‘honk if you have had your vasectomy.”
Searches for “vasectomy” increased by 115 percent in the US during the week of May 2022
He travels 700 miles all throughout Iowa each month. He traveled to a number of Planned Parenthood facilities between Iowa and Missouri in November and performed 110 free vasectomies there. These facilities previously performed abortions. “They had been relying on the contraception that their partners were using. They came and said things like, ‘I am doing this because I cannot rely on the termination of a pregnancy, which was my last option’,” says Guarín.
There are several anecdotal reports that American males are rushing to get vasectomies, despite the lack of official data as of yet. Google Trends data reveals that searches for “vasectomy” increased by 115 percent in the US during the week in May 2022 when the decision to repeal Roe v. Wade was made public. Searches increased by 285 percent during the week when the decision was officially revealed compared to the same period last year. It is obvious that demand has remained constant. The number of searches in April of this year increased by 25% from pre-pandemic levels.
Following the official announcement of the Roe v. Wade ruling, the number of vasectomy surgeries increased dramatically
A team of urologists from the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio tracked data on vasectomy procedure billing from 2018 to this year at a sizable midwestern healthcare system that included 13 community hospitals in urban and rural settings for a research paper that was published in the International Journal of Impotence. Following the official announcement of the Roe v. Wade ruling, the number of vasectomy surgeries increased dramatically. The healthcare facility was doing 218 procedures per month by August 2022. This was more than twice what it was on a monthly basis in 2018.
These statistics include patients who had requested consultations before to the decision, but the research suggested that the decision likely prompted them to schedule the treatment. The pattern is anticipated to persist. They reported a 22 percent rise in consultations and a 35 percent increase in requests for consultations year over year. Importantly, the researchers noted a significant shift in the demographics of male patients. In the past, males who underwent a vasectomy were more mature and had families. The people who undergo the snip these days are younger and considerably more likely to be childless.
“Younger men, especially those under 30, as well as childless men were significantly more likely to seek consultation”
“Younger men, especially those under 30, as well as childless men were significantly more likely to seek consultation post-Dobbs compared to the prior reproductive legal climate,” the report said. “Findings indicate that men are invested in maintaining reproductive autonomy for themselves and their partners.”
After Roe v Wade was overturned, the median age of a man getting a vasectomy fell from 38 to 35 years. Nearly a quarter was under 30, compared to just one in 10 in 2021. The 2022 cohort was also less likely to be married. The share who did not already have children doubled from one in 12 to one in six. “The overturning of Roe v Wade in June 2022 has changed the landscape of family planning for male partners,” the report said. “The immediacy with which this change was seen indicates that the post-Dobbs generation has already been significantly affected by the legal climate and the population-based consequences of this decision will continue to be seen in multiple ways for decades to come.”
Vasectomy rates are on the rise, which poses a threat to the greater decline in the birth rate in the United States
Vasectomy rates are on the rise, which poses a threat to the greater decline in the birth rate in the United States. The birth rate fell to its third-lowest level in 40 years in 2021. According to Kenneth Johnson, professor of sociology and senior demographer at the Carsey School, 8.6 million more children would have been born in the United States by 2021 if the fertility rate from 2007 had persisted in the years after the financial crisis. In addition, there is a second vasectomy revolution that is unrelated to Roe v. Wade. Marc Goldstein, professor, and director of male reproductive medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York, reports that the number of consultations at his New York practice has doubled in the past six months.
“What I’m seeing is very similar to what we saw during the great recession of 2008,” he says. “Back then, there was a marked increase in demand for these activities and a decrease in demand for reversals, and this was clearly related to economics, people felt they just couldn’t afford to have more children. “The patients who are coming to me today are almost all couples who have decided that this is not a world into which they want to bring children,” says Goldstein. Half say they cannot afford to, he adds. Others cite climate change. “I’m seeing men in their early 30s who have never had children but have decided that this isn’t the world they’d ever want to bring children into,” says Goldstein. Goldstein himself uses a method known as the “no scalpel” vasectomy. “I brought it back from China,” says Goldstein. It was a technique developed during the era of the One Child Policy – an era that created a demographic timebomb. Abortion is acceptable here. Men, meanwhile, are motivated differently.