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The Cost Of Contraception · She's On The Money

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Speaker 1: Hello, my name's Santasha Nabananga Bamblet. I'm a proud yr
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Speaker 1: the Order Kerni Whoalbury and a waddery woman. And before
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Speaker 1: we get started on She's on the Money podcast, I
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Speaker 1: would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land
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Speaker 1: of which this podcast is recorded on a wondery country,
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Speaker 1: acknowledging the elders, the ancestors and the next generation coming through.
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Speaker 1: As this podcast is about connecting, empowering, knowledge sharing and
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Speaker 1: the storytelling of you to make a difference for today
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Speaker 1: and lasting impact for tomorrow.
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Speaker 2: Let's get into it.
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Speaker 3: She's on the Money, She's on the Money.
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Speaker 4: Hello, and welcome to She's on the Money podcast for
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Speaker 4: millennials who want financial freedom. Recently, you guys slim to
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Speaker 4: our DMS on one of our Friday episodes about who
1:06
Speaker 4: should pay for contraception and there also is currently a
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Speaker 4: Senate inquiry into reproductive health care in Australia, so we
1:13
Speaker 4: thought we should have a bigger conversation on the show
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Speaker 4: about this because it doesn't to.
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Speaker 2: Be talked about. Victoria.
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Speaker 4: You've got some feelings, I have feelings back, and you're
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Speaker 4: with us as ever are, so let's hear them.
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Speaker 2: I have so many big feelings, and I think that
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Speaker 2: today's episode is very, very welcome because today we are
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Speaker 2: not only just talking about contraception, but who should pay
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Speaker 2: for it, how hard it is to access, and what
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Speaker 2: the costs and stat on this one hundred percent vital
1:38
Speaker 2: and basic human right is and are. And I am
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Speaker 2: really excited about it because I feel like it's not
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Speaker 2: just a conversation that extends to women having sex with men,
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Speaker 2: like it's women who are sexually active, men who are
1:51
Speaker 2: sexually active, just people who are sexually active in general.
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Speaker 2: And you and I have had this conversation offline where
1:57
Speaker 2: it just gets a bit weird, like who pays for
1:59
Speaker 2: war in different circumstances, And I hope that this can
2:02
Speaker 2: help you, guys, I guess, clear it up, but not
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Speaker 2: only clear it up, but have cleaner and easier conversations
2:07
Speaker 2: around it. Like it shouldn't be a topic where it's icky.
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Speaker 2: It should just be a conversation where it's kind of
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Speaker 2: like if we got milk in the fridge and you go, yeah,
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Speaker 2: it's milk in the fridge, and then like that's the
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Speaker 2: end of the conversation. And it's not a he said
2:18
Speaker 2: she said, like, it's just what it is, if that
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Speaker 2: makes sense.
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Speaker 5: I want to.
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Speaker 2: Start off this whole episode, Beck by just I guess
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Speaker 2: framing a few things. So it is vital obviously to
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Speaker 2: protect against STDs and STIs and that is a given,
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Speaker 2: But this conversation is mostly looking at contraception, of which
2:35
Speaker 2: barrier protections are also used. And it should always, always,
2:38
Speaker 2: always be okay to discuss this with your partner. And
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Speaker 2: if not, Beck, red flag, red flag, biggest red flag
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Speaker 2: in the entire world. It is all too common for
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Speaker 2: conversations around women's bodies to be weaponized in abusive relationships,
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Speaker 2: and that is a big red no no from me.
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Speaker 2: And if you need support, we have linked to one
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Speaker 2: eight hundred respect in our notes and please, please please
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Speaker 2: get support from someone you trust. Every single person's body
3:01
Speaker 2: is different, so support from your GP or doctor about
3:04
Speaker 2: what contraception is right for you is going to be
3:07
Speaker 2: really important as well. And just because it works for
3:10
Speaker 2: one person, which we'll probably discuss today, it might send
3:13
Speaker 2: somebody else absolutely batty like it has done for me,
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Speaker 2: and that doesn't mean it is the right fit for you.
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Speaker 2: So I feel like conversations, you know, ad brunch with
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Speaker 2: your girlfriends were You're like, oh, my gosh, what have
3:23
Speaker 2: you got? And you're like, I've got the Marina. Like,
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Speaker 2: it's not the best way to decide what type of
3:28
Speaker 2: contraception you should or could have. It's actually really important
3:32
Speaker 2: to discuss this with a healthcare professional and somebody who
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Speaker 2: can put you in I guess the driver's seat, not
3:37
Speaker 2: just your friend being like, oh, it works great for me,
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Speaker 2: you should get it too, because that happened with the
3:41
Speaker 2: implant on in my arm and then I bled for
3:43
Speaker 2: three months straight and I went absolutely ape shit, like
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Speaker 2: it was one out of ten cannot recommend. My gosh,
3:50
Speaker 2: that sounds so brutal. Yeah, but you know when you're
3:53
Speaker 2: just like, why is this working for all of my friends?
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Speaker 2: And then when I went back to my regular GP,
3:59
Speaker 2: he was like, yeah, yeah, like why did you go
4:01
Speaker 2: to some other GP and get this? And I was like, oh,
4:03
Speaker 2: because I looked them up and they were like, you know,
4:05
Speaker 2: female reproductive specialists and that made sense. And he was like, yeah,
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Speaker 2: but I could have told you that wasn't gonna work
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Speaker 2: for you because this other contraception didn't work for you.
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Speaker 2: And I was like, well, could have just kept my
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Speaker 2: health care consistent and we wouldn't have a problem. Could
4:17
Speaker 2: have saved a bit of money. Yeah, bit of money,
4:19
Speaker 2: bit of time, bit of stress, a lot of anger,
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Speaker 2: a lot of anger. But that is okay, And I
4:24
Speaker 2: mean to really just reiterate that, Beck, it's not a
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Speaker 2: one size fits all and your contraceptive needs are as
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Speaker 2: unique as you are, so talk to someone who knows
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Speaker 2: what they're talking about. It not just your mates. When
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Speaker 2: I was single, Beck, it was actually about me protecting me.
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Speaker 2: But then as soon as I was in a relationship,
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Speaker 2: that really changed and it became my view that contraception
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Speaker 2: is a cost of being in a relationship and that
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Speaker 2: goes for everybody. But in that episode, Jess then said, oh, well,
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Speaker 2: I've always paid for it, and she uses the pills,
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Speaker 2: so it's not quote that expensive for her in her circumstances,
4:56
Speaker 2: with her financial situation. But we're all different, and I
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Speaker 2: I guess that's why it's important to open up this conversation.
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Speaker 2: And when you suggested we did a whole episode on this,
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Speaker 2: I was like, actually that's a really good idea, Beck,
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Speaker 2: Thank you v smart woman. Oh my goodness.
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Speaker 4: And it's funny too, because I think that I went
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Speaker 4: away and thought about it, and I was like, Okay,
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Speaker 4: I don't need to use contraception for the traditional reasons,
5:18
Speaker 4: but I have considered it to stop my period because
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Speaker 4: periods can be annoying and for all these other reasons,
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Speaker 4: and so it's not just for exactly as you say,
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Speaker 4: one person, one type of person, for one type of reason.
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Speaker 2: It can be for anyone. I love bec that You're like,
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Speaker 2: I've thought about using contraception to stop my period, and
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Speaker 2: I'm like the exact opposite. I at my whole entire soul,
5:41
Speaker 2: am just really hippy dippy, Like I just would be like, no,
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Speaker 2: don't stop your period. That's natural. We should be talking
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Speaker 2: about regulating your hormones and having a really consistent and
5:50
Speaker 2: beautiful period. Yeah, cut it out, put it in the bin.
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Speaker 2: Let's not do it. I don't want to do it
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Speaker 2: ever again. But I know it is stop that. No,
5:58
Speaker 2: I'm like, do you know your fertilities?
6:00
Speaker 5: Cool?
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Speaker 2: Like I'm one of those HEBDP people. I know when
6:03
Speaker 2: I'm ovulating, not because I track it, because I can
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Speaker 2: feel it. Wow, it's wild. That is actually very impressive.
6:10
Speaker 2: I remember saying that to a doctor a little while ago,
6:12
Speaker 2: because recently i've shared a bit about our fertility journey
6:15
Speaker 2: online and I won't go into that here, but it's
6:17
Speaker 2: funny because when you start talking to doctors about fertility,
6:20
Speaker 2: they're like, oh, obviously tracking your ovulation is great. I'm like, oh, no,
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Speaker 2: I know when not ogulate and I thought that was
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Speaker 2: normal and they were like, what do you mean. I
6:28
Speaker 2: was like, you know the little pop that you get
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Speaker 2: maybe like twelve to fourteen days after your period ince
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Speaker 2: and they're like what. I'm like, yeah, sometimes it's the leftovery,
6:36
Speaker 2: sometimes it's the right. Like oh, they're like, what app
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Speaker 2: do you use? No, No, I feel it. I can
6:42
Speaker 2: feel it. And turns out that's not normal. That's not normal.
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Speaker 2: It's impressive though, it's very impressive. It's like a little
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Speaker 2: flex that I don't know what it does for me
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Speaker 2: when you can literally just track it. But yeah, time,
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Speaker 2: So anyway, we'll have another conversation about that.
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Speaker 4: Well off mic excitation about it, Sylvia. I've read that
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Speaker 4: in Australia, one in two women will experience and unplanned
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Speaker 4: pregnancy in their lifetime. More than half of these women
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Speaker 4: were using at least one form of contraception at that time.
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Speaker 4: That info was from MSI Australia formerly known as Maurice Stops.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, they're a really good plays for research and stuff
7:18
Speaker 2: like that, but I guess that kind of leads into
7:22
Speaker 2: that's the research back. But it's it's interesting as well
7:25
Speaker 2: because I think we all in some form know someone
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Speaker 2: who's gotten pregnant unexpectedly. Like I remember in Grade twelve
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Speaker 2: when of the girls got pregnant. She was one of
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Speaker 2: my girlfriends, and she ended up having honestly the most
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Speaker 2: beautiful baby, and she's like killed it at life since then.
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Speaker 2: I remember her being like fully nine months pregnant when
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Speaker 2: we're doing our Year twelve exams at the end of
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Speaker 2: the year, and she was just like the best hustler
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Speaker 2: you've ever known. Anyway, I remember her circumstance. She I'm
7:53
Speaker 2: pretty sure she used contraception, but then she also took
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Speaker 2: the morning after pill and still stayed pregnant. Wow, that
8:00
Speaker 2: baby was meant to be here. Yeah, like's wild. But
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Speaker 2: I've also had a number of other girlfriends experienced unplanned pregnancies,
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Speaker 2: and whilst it can be really stressful, it doesn't mean
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Speaker 2: that contraception is always one hundred percent, right mmmmmmm. Absolutely.
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Speaker 4: This is probably a bit controversial but I'm wondering, what
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Speaker 4: do you reckon if there was something this common for men,
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Speaker 4: do you think it would be something that would be
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Speaker 4: not discussed? It would just be automatically, very accessible, very cheap.
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Speaker 4: Both parties would pay. Like, do you think that if
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Speaker 4: it was the other way around and it was on
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Speaker 4: the other foot and men had to take contraception, how
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Speaker 4: do you think the position would change?
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Speaker 2: Well, it's interesting because I don't know what you know
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Speaker 2: about biology, Beck, but actually get this, takes two to tango,
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Speaker 2: and you actually need a male sperm and you need
8:50
Speaker 2: a female egg, yeah, to create a baby. Don't believe it,
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Speaker 2: I know, But unplanned pregnancy, like it's not going to
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Speaker 2: happen in a female female relationship, not going to happen
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Speaker 2: in male male relation, not gonna happen in a lot
9:01
Speaker 2: of circumstances that I don't understand. But at the end
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Speaker 2: of the day, guaranteed, every single unplanned pregnancy came from
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Speaker 2: those true things coming together. And it blows my mind
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Speaker 2: that after two people choose to tango, it's then the
9:16
Speaker 2: female having to take that responsibility, and it's apparently the
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Speaker 2: female's responsibility to protect themselves and their one egg. Why
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Speaker 2: is it my job as a female to protect my
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Speaker 2: one egg that I get every single month?
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Speaker 4: Right?
9:30
Speaker 2: Like I could have sex literally every single day with
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Speaker 2: a different person, and if I got pregnant, it would
9:36
Speaker 2: be with one person. Yes, a male could go and
9:39
Speaker 2: have sex every single day and get literally every single
9:43
Speaker 2: person every single day because he has millions of sperm
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Speaker 2: and they regenerate. Why is it not on him? They
9:50
Speaker 2: protect him? So true? Why is it not his responsibility?
9:53
Speaker 2: But it's my job to keep my one egg? Like
9:56
Speaker 2: what that is so true? I'm the bad person if
9:59
Speaker 2: I have too much sex, Like, if I have too
10:02
Speaker 2: much sex, I'm seen to be maybe not as as
10:05
Speaker 2: kosher as somebody who doesn't have as much sex. But
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Speaker 2: when a guy does it or get it, guys like, sorry,
10:11
Speaker 2: you could have got our entire country pregnant. At this point,
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Speaker 2: I don't understand. I don't even have that capacity. I
10:18
Speaker 2: have the capacity for having one baby in a nine
10:21
Speaker 2: month period. Who knows if that baby's going to work
10:23
Speaker 2: out for me either because miscarriage is so high. But
10:27
Speaker 2: then also it's only with one person. The damage a
10:32
Speaker 2: dude could do in nine months, I know, I know
10:35
Speaker 2: that's so true that my responsibility.
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Speaker 4: Yeah, and it's kind of like, you know, if you
10:40
Speaker 4: have a male dog, the male dog will be sexed
10:44
Speaker 4: because it's seven balls chopped off, because they can go
10:47
Speaker 4: and impregnate multiple differctly.
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Speaker 2: So why is it change when it's a human. That's
10:53
Speaker 2: where they you know, yeah, exactly, because we live in
10:55
Speaker 2: a patriarchal society, Beck, is what it comes to. And
11:00
Speaker 2: I really think that if contraception was a male responsibility,
11:04
Speaker 2: it would just be second nature, Like you could probably
11:06
Speaker 2: just get the pill at the supermarket, to be honest,
11:08
Speaker 2: it'd probably be free. At this point. They'd be giving
11:10
Speaker 2: it out in schools like it's wild, right, Like they
11:13
Speaker 2: give condoms out in schools, And that's the type of
11:16
Speaker 2: contraception that is, I guess the biggest responsibility for a male,
11:20
Speaker 2: because they're not going to go to their GP and
11:22
Speaker 2: get a script for a pill that they can't take
11:24
Speaker 2: so that they go, oh, hey, Beck, I'd really like
11:26
Speaker 2: to have sex with you. Could you take this pill
11:28
Speaker 2: as our form of contraception? Like that's not no exactly
11:31
Speaker 2: yet hot right, But like even the research going into
11:36
Speaker 2: male contraception I've been looking a lot into recently, and
11:39
Speaker 2: they're really worried about it because there's too many side effects.
11:43
Speaker 2: But the side effect list of what men would experience
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Speaker 2: if they took an oral contraceptive is less than a
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Speaker 2: quarter of what the side effect list is for women
11:53
Speaker 2: who take oral contraceptives. Really, yeah, isn't that wild? But
11:57
Speaker 2: they're like, oh, that's a bit much for men. I
11:59
Speaker 2: wouldn't want to put them at that much risk. But
12:01
Speaker 2: you put me like, have you ever bought a pack
12:03
Speaker 2: of oral contraceptives and pulled out the fact sheet on
12:06
Speaker 2: that thing? Like, if you've read it, you're basically gonna die.
12:10
Speaker 2: Like every single, like teeny tiny word on that thing
12:14
Speaker 2: is going, Oh you could die from this, you could
12:16
Speaker 2: die from that. You could also have a stroke. Also,
12:18
Speaker 2: you're probably gonna have blood clot issues. You're probably gonna
12:20
Speaker 2: have headaches. That's just a give you're gonna die reading
12:23
Speaker 2: this reading this paper because it's gonna take so damn long.
12:27
Speaker 2: But men, a quarter of that too much risk. I mean,
12:31
Speaker 2: we could go on and on about even just like
12:33
Speaker 2: the healthcare system of male thresholds. But beck, of course
12:37
Speaker 2: we also need I'm not like trashing the pill here
12:39
Speaker 2: at all. I have been on oral contraceptives myself before,
12:43
Speaker 2: and I know at some point in my life I'll
12:45
Speaker 2: probably go back on them. I'm not against them. I
12:47
Speaker 2: just think this concept that it's too risky for a
12:50
Speaker 2: man to take on a quarter of the risk that
12:52
Speaker 2: women already take on and I expected to take on. Right, Like,
12:57
Speaker 2: if you are a female having sex with men, and
13:00
Speaker 2: I know that a question you would be asked before
13:03
Speaker 2: you know, having coitious is are you on the pill?
13:08
Speaker 1: Yeah?
13:08
Speaker 2: They just straight outside are you on the pill? As
13:11
Speaker 2: if it's an expectation that I would be putting my
13:14
Speaker 2: body through that so they don't have to use a.
13:16
Speaker 4: Condom on behalf of everyone like me, I'm so sorry
13:22
Speaker 4: to you.
13:22
Speaker 2: And what do you mean you're sorry? I'm just kidding you,
13:25
Speaker 2: you lucky little shit. Anyway, I think it's funny because
13:29
Speaker 2: you know, the more you dig into it, the wilder
13:32
Speaker 2: it gets. And I am in a very grateful position
13:36
Speaker 2: where you know, I'm married to my husband. I adore him.
13:40
Speaker 2: But he really gets it, like he thinks it's wild too.
13:42
Speaker 2: He's like, why would you put your body through that?
13:45
Speaker 2: Like it's a good question, Pabe, It's a very good question.
13:48
Speaker 2: It's fair question. But I could just use a condom,
13:51
Speaker 2: and I'm like, why can't every male have this idea
13:54
Speaker 2: in their head that it's their responsibility as well, But
13:57
Speaker 2: again I'm married. Well, let's go back to what you
14:00
Speaker 2: were talking about at the start of this episode. You
14:02
Speaker 2: mentioned the current Senate inquiry into Reproductive Healthcare in Australia
14:06
Speaker 2: BECK and it's not wrapped up yet, but there have
14:08
Speaker 2: been some pretty alarming things that have come out of
14:11
Speaker 2: that that really highlight the need for this to be
14:13
Speaker 2: further discussed. So let's get into a few of the
14:16
Speaker 2: dock points, because not everybody is I guess, as nerdy
14:20
Speaker 2: as me and has read everything in that inquiry, so
14:24
Speaker 2: I can like cut it down. So first things first,
14:27
Speaker 2: doctors and pharmacy groups making submissions to the inquiry have
14:30
Speaker 2: actually warned that varying costs of contraception mean thousands of
14:34
Speaker 2: women are not accessing the best options for their health
14:37
Speaker 2: and called for more products to be added to the PBS,
14:40
Speaker 2: which is the Pharmaceutical Benefit Scheme. And Professor Danielle Masa
14:44
Speaker 2: is an advisor in Women's health with the Royal Australian
14:47
Speaker 2: College of GPS. She's actually called for a regulatory solution
14:51
Speaker 2: that gives Australians access to contraceptive options they need at
14:55
Speaker 2: low or no cost, very sexy, saying that they are
14:58
Speaker 2: quote essential to women's productive health. I like that. I
15:02
Speaker 2: feel like it's good. Right, Yeah, that's really good. It
15:05
Speaker 2: kind of just makes sense. Yeah, it does make sense because,
15:09
Speaker 2: as we were saying before, if this was a male
15:11
Speaker 2: in this circumstance, it would be free, right, I mean
15:14
Speaker 2: one can speculate, yeah, it would be free or be
15:17
Speaker 2: super cheap because you wouldn't want to impact, you know,
15:19
Speaker 2: a man's ability to generate an income. Oh my gosh, no,
15:23
Speaker 2: that would be so rude. I would die to.
15:26
Speaker 4: See what the world would look like if men got pregnant.
15:29
Speaker 4: I know, right, but you know, can.
15:31
Speaker 2: You imagine the like paternity leave cover if the men
15:34
Speaker 2: carried the babies, they'd be like, oh, they're gonna need
15:37
Speaker 2: two years off. They're gonna need two years off and fifty.
15:40
Speaker 4: Foot rubs like from would be wild point of conception
15:45
Speaker 4: to three years after the baby, their.
15:47
Speaker 2: Own paternity leaf, their own paternity leaf. Like there is
15:50
Speaker 2: no way men should put up with morning sickness and
15:53
Speaker 2: go to work and work a forty hour job and
15:55
Speaker 2: deal with a toddler. Absolutely not. They'd be like free
15:58
Speaker 2: in home help like the guver. It would be. Yeah,
16:01
Speaker 2: the government would give men helpers in their houses to
16:04
Speaker 2: deal with that. I wouldn't be shocked. But for any
16:07
Speaker 2: dude listening, we just plan silly. We're just silly little
16:12
Speaker 2: women with silly little opinions. Thing funny, but let's talk
16:17
Speaker 2: about the pill. I'm really key to talk about the pill. Yeah,
16:19
Speaker 2: I've got some more stats on the pills. So under
16:22
Speaker 2: the topic of the pill, women are being forced to
16:24
Speaker 2: pay three times as much for newer birth control pills
16:27
Speaker 2: or use older products with potentially worse side effects because
16:30
Speaker 2: the most recent contraceptive options are not subsidized and there
16:34
Speaker 2: aren't on the PBS. The Pharmaceutical Benefit Scheme, which lists
16:38
Speaker 2: all the medicines that are subsidized by the federal government,
16:41
Speaker 2: caps a four month supply of the oral contraceptive pill
16:44
Speaker 2: of thirty dollars or seven dollars and thirty cents for
16:48
Speaker 2: a healthcare card holder. Although some generic brands are cheaper,
16:51
Speaker 2: which is a little bit of a money win. Newer products,
16:54
Speaker 2: though beg that are more commonly prescribed, can actually cost
16:58
Speaker 2: triple that amount, So three month supply of popular contraceptive pills,
17:02
Speaker 2: so like zolion, yeahs and others, they can cost eighty
17:05
Speaker 2: seven dollars ninety nine, seventy four dollars ninety nine, and
17:09
Speaker 2: eighty three dollars thirty nine, respectively. According to the data
17:12
Speaker 2: held by Reproductive nonprofit MSI, Australia, women are paying seventy
17:18
Speaker 2: six dollars and thirty nine cents for a three month
17:21
Speaker 2: supply of progesterone only pill slender while MICROLT, an older
17:25
Speaker 2: progesterone only pill that doctors say can be actually less
17:28
Speaker 2: effective and cause irregular bleeding, that's subsidized at eleven dollars
17:32
Speaker 2: ninety nine for four months. Oh, it isn't very wild,
17:35
Speaker 2: but like it's so unfair, Like if you are a
17:39
Speaker 2: lower income earner, even if you're not a lower income earner,
17:42
Speaker 2: the difference between paying twelve bucks in like close to
17:45
Speaker 2: eighty bucks, that's a lot. Like that's a lot of money.
17:49
Speaker 2: Like you can't just blink and go, oh, well, that's
17:51
Speaker 2: the cost of having good quality contraception. I'm sorry. Why
17:54
Speaker 2: do we have to put a cost on good quality
17:57
Speaker 2: contraception when we're arguing on the flip side that it's
18:01
Speaker 2: a basic human right absolutely not. And then Pharmacy Guild
18:05
Speaker 2: Senior Vice President Natalie Willis says, advances in technology over
18:09
Speaker 2: the past twenty five years have led to new pills
18:11
Speaker 2: that have offered greater benefits in terms of reduced side
18:14
Speaker 2: effects and smaller doses. But Beck, these guys aren't subsidized.
18:19
Speaker 2: So if you would like, do you have reduced side
18:22
Speaker 2: effects and less medication going through your body, that's actually
18:25
Speaker 2: going to cost you a lot of money.
18:27
Speaker 4: That is I'm not gonna use the F word here,
18:30
Speaker 4: but I think you know what I'm trying to say.
18:32
Speaker 2: I'm going to say that's fucked. It's messed up. It's
18:35
Speaker 2: a messed up, it's a messed up. I couldn't think
18:37
Speaker 2: of any other word. It's not scary. It's a word
18:40
Speaker 2: that I use as a crutch sometimes, like when I
18:44
Speaker 2: really want to emphasize the point, like I don't know, honestly,
18:47
Speaker 2: I don't know a word that's more dynamic. You can,
18:49
Speaker 2: it's certainly right. You can put the F word in
18:52
Speaker 2: anything any good sentence. F word works, bad sentence, F
18:56
Speaker 2: word work hundred, normal sentence is real basic. We're just
18:59
Speaker 2: trying to absolutely casual. F word works, effod works everywhere.
19:03
Speaker 2: I'd say, let's go have a little break, and I'm
19:06
Speaker 2: personally going to be looking up other words to use,
19:08
Speaker 2: and then we'll come back. Yeah, I heard that this
19:10
Speaker 2: swearing too much is a lack of intelligence, So we
19:13
Speaker 2: need to come across as very intelligent human beings podcasts.
19:17
Speaker 2: So we'll do some research and we'll be back on
19:19
Speaker 2: the flip side. See then, hello, and welcome back to
19:26
Speaker 2: She's on the Money, the very eloquent podcast where two
19:29
Speaker 2: women who are very culturally diverse talk about smart yeah,
19:34
Speaker 2: very important topics with very long words, very long words,
19:38
Speaker 2: very long words that we don't have to pause and
19:40
Speaker 2: read first and try. No, it's like the finance industry, right,
19:44
Speaker 2: Like I am convinced that mediocre, middle aged white men
19:47
Speaker 2: just use complicated words to make us feel bad about
19:49
Speaker 2: ourselves and make themselves seem smart, because like, when it
19:52
Speaker 2: comes down to it, this stuff's not that complicated. But
19:55
Speaker 2: like if they don't make it complicated, what do I
19:58
Speaker 2: even do when they say they're an investment banker? That
20:01
Speaker 2: Now that's a good question, right now, that's a very
20:03
Speaker 2: good question. Maybe that's why contraception is such a long word.
20:06
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, makes sense. That makes sense. Actually story
20:10
Speaker 2: checks out. Malvi.
20:11
Speaker 4: We are talking about contraception today and the cost of contraception,
20:16
Speaker 4: and it's getting a little bit.
20:18
Speaker 2: I would say, would you say heated, we're getting what
20:21
Speaker 2: would you say? Maybe we're passionate. Our passion is showing. Yes, yeah,
20:27
Speaker 2: our passion is showing. And honestly, I like the way
20:30
Speaker 2: it looks. I just I get really frustrated when it
20:32
Speaker 2: comes to, I guess, just this whole topic of equality
20:36
Speaker 2: and equity, and I just feel like, in twenty twenty three,
20:40
Speaker 2: I shouldn't have to argue to have access for our community,
20:45
Speaker 2: for basic human rights and basic human needs. And we
20:49
Speaker 2: already know that women in Australia who experience an unexpected
20:52
Speaker 2: pregnancy are more likely to be a low income owner.
20:55
Speaker 2: And I am going to, you know, extrapolate that out
20:58
Speaker 2: and make some predictions that that's because you can't afford
21:01
Speaker 2: the health care necessary to get the pill.
21:03
Speaker 1: Right.
21:04
Speaker 2: And even when I was at UNI, I was in
21:05
Speaker 2: the very fortunate position where I was fully employed at UNI.
21:08
Speaker 2: And I mean I have always lived a relatively privileged life,
21:12
Speaker 2: right Like, I have been very lucky in that I've
21:15
Speaker 2: always been on my parents' Medicare card. I've always had
21:19
Speaker 2: Mum and Dad as a fallback, Like I know, if
21:21
Speaker 2: I couldn't have afforded a doctor's appointment, Mum would have
21:24
Speaker 2: just paid for it. And like we talked about this
21:27
Speaker 2: a little while ago when we talked about the bank
21:29
Speaker 2: of Mum and Dad, and we talked about this concept
21:32
Speaker 2: of having an emergency fund when you don't really have
21:35
Speaker 2: an emergency fund. And I've always been one of those
21:37
Speaker 2: kids where you know, Mum and Dad aren't wealthy or
21:40
Speaker 2: rich by any stretch of the imagination, but they always
21:43
Speaker 2: have been that safety blanket of knowing right. And so
21:48
Speaker 2: I never really skipped medical appointments because it always was
21:52
Speaker 2: written in reach and it could always be bog billed.
21:55
Speaker 2: And I mean in twenty twenty three, that has changed
21:57
Speaker 2: and bog billing is no longer as easily accessible as.
22:00
Speaker 5: It once was.
22:01
Speaker 2: But even as a young woman, I just couldn't be
22:03
Speaker 2: bothered half the time going back to the doctor to
22:06
Speaker 2: get another three month script of the pill. Like, and
22:09
Speaker 2: I know that that can be I have ADHD. So
22:12
Speaker 2: I am inherently lazy, Like I do not want to
22:15
Speaker 2: do that, right, but it's also one of those things
22:18
Speaker 2: where it's like, it's not just about access, it's about
22:21
Speaker 2: So you're saying I need to go to the doctor
22:23
Speaker 2: a minimum of four times a year to collect a
22:26
Speaker 2: prescription medication that I can't tell you when the last
22:30
Speaker 2: time my husband saw a doctor was No, couldn't tell you.
22:33
Speaker 2: That's brutal. If I said time a year, I said, bab,
22:36
Speaker 2: who's your GP, he'd be like black grand prix what, Yeah,
22:40
Speaker 2: he was a GP? He would not. I don't think
22:42
Speaker 2: he would have a normal GP because like, men do
22:45
Speaker 2: not see they they should, but they don't see the
22:48
Speaker 2: doctor nearly as often as women do because we kind
22:51
Speaker 2: of are forced into it. And I just think it's
22:53
Speaker 2: to me a wild concept that, yeah, we're still arguing
22:58
Speaker 2: for equality, equity, and I mean it stretches into beck,
23:03
Speaker 2: where are you getting the time for these four appointments?
23:04
Speaker 1: Now?
23:05
Speaker 4: Definitely definitely V Before the break, we're talking about the
23:08
Speaker 4: findings in the Senate inquiry, and I guess, like, and
23:11
Speaker 4: forgive me because I actually have no idea about this stuff,
23:13
Speaker 4: as you know, But where do we stand in terms
23:17
Speaker 4: of long acting and reversible contraceptions?
23:20
Speaker 2: Yeah? So before we just talked about general and then
23:22
Speaker 2: we talked about the pill, and there's obviously more contraceptive
23:26
Speaker 2: options than that. So I guess to dive straight back
23:29
Speaker 2: into me giving you some stats and facts about these things.
23:32
Speaker 2: Let's talk about the long active and reversible contraceptive options.
23:36
Speaker 2: So from reading everything, it's glaringly obvious that Australia is
23:41
Speaker 2: falling behind as global peers on the use of long
23:44
Speaker 2: acting and reversible contraceptives like into uterine devices. So that's
23:48
Speaker 2: like a Marina or a what they calling a copper
23:51
Speaker 2: coil hormonal ireuds or into unterine devices. These are small
23:56
Speaker 2: devices that are basically put into your uterus to prevent ignancy.
24:01
Speaker 2: They are subsidized on the PBS and they cost about
24:04
Speaker 2: thirty bucks or seven dollars thirty with a healthcare card. However,
24:08
Speaker 2: copper IUDs, which some women prefer, BECK and I don't
24:12
Speaker 2: think that there's a lot of conversation around this because
24:15
Speaker 2: they are far more long acting than something like a Marina,
24:19
Speaker 2: which is a name brand. There's lots of different kinds,
24:22
Speaker 2: but copper IUDs Beck, they don't actually use hormones. The
24:26
Speaker 2: copper is kind of like a natural contraceptive when placed
24:30
Speaker 2: in the uterus. But these are more expensive, and they're
24:33
Speaker 2: typically between eighty and ninety dollars, and so that's a
24:36
Speaker 2: very big difference from like seven dollars thirty if you've
24:39
Speaker 2: got a healthcare card and you can't access it.
24:41
Speaker 1: Right.
24:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, So back to our friend, Professor Danielle Maza, who
24:44
Speaker 2: we mentioned just before. She said that IUDs reduce the
24:48
Speaker 2: levels of unwanted pregnancies, but there was not enough GP
24:52
Speaker 2: training or compensation to encourage their uptake. And she said
24:56
Speaker 2: that gps are always trying to tell us the rebate
24:59
Speaker 2: is too low to reflect the cost of a practitioner
25:01
Speaker 2: to deliver that service. So obviously I'm not a doctor,
25:06
Speaker 2: so I don't know how long it takes. But what
25:08
Speaker 2: I do know is that there are lots of different
25:11
Speaker 2: ways to get an into unine device into your uterus,
25:15
Speaker 2: and it depends on I guess, your pain threshold, which
25:19
Speaker 2: you know, as women, we are expected to have a
25:21
Speaker 2: much higher pain threshold than men, right. And I remember
25:24
Speaker 2: talking through this option with my doctor because I have
25:27
Speaker 2: had a marina before and it worked really well for me,
25:30
Speaker 2: and I went into my GP, my GP explained, oh,
25:34
Speaker 2: I don't do it, but you'd have to go to
25:35
Speaker 2: this other GP to do it, and like, we could
25:38
Speaker 2: do it in the clinic and basically you'd come in Victoria,
25:41
Speaker 2: what you do, pop a couple of neurofit and then
25:44
Speaker 2: you come in and we do the insertion. You might
25:47
Speaker 2: be a little bit crampy, but you should be fine,
25:50
Speaker 2: and that will just be the cost of a normal
25:51
Speaker 2: GP service. But we only have one doctor in the
25:54
Speaker 2: whole clinic who does it, and she's booked out for
25:57
Speaker 2: three months because no other doctor was trained in it. Right.
26:00
Speaker 2: So I started looking into it, and because I had
26:02
Speaker 2: never given birth before, it was recommended. And this is
26:06
Speaker 2: me doing my own research, Like my GP didn't suggest this.
26:09
Speaker 2: And I now have a new GP who's a legend,
26:11
Speaker 2: so if you see me at the GP, it's not
26:13
Speaker 2: him that we're talking about. I did a lot of
26:16
Speaker 2: research on forums and realized that maybe that wasn't the
26:19
Speaker 2: best option because it's actually like a birth pain and
26:23
Speaker 2: the bit of cramping that you have because they're opening
26:26
Speaker 2: your cervix and putting something in your uterus actually could
26:30
Speaker 2: be contractions. Oh isn't that real hard? That's so I
26:35
Speaker 2: did a bit more research and I ended up going
26:37
Speaker 2: to a fertility clinic to have it put in, and
26:39
Speaker 2: I got put to sleep to have it put in.
26:41
Speaker 2: And before you get put to sleep, they like take
26:44
Speaker 2: you into a GP and you know, you have a
26:46
Speaker 2: chat with them and they explain the process. And I said, oh,
26:49
Speaker 2: I'm here because I did my own reading and my
26:52
Speaker 2: you know, my reading on these forums said that I
26:54
Speaker 2: probably should be put to sleep because I've never given birth.
26:57
Speaker 2: And that doctor was horrified, like are you saying that?
27:00
Speaker 2: Your GP said just pop two in Europan and like
27:03
Speaker 2: come in and have this interview to around deserted and
27:05
Speaker 2: I was like, yeah, like that's what they said. And
27:08
Speaker 2: then because I thought I was relatively like you know,
27:12
Speaker 2: ahead of my time getting this thing. So I had
27:14
Speaker 2: it like maybe eight or nine years ago put in, right.
27:17
Speaker 2: I remember then having these conversations with my friends and
27:20
Speaker 2: they're like, oh, yeah, that was like the most traumatic
27:23
Speaker 2: experience of my life. I had it put in in
27:25
Speaker 2: the doctors, and you know, I went into cramps and
27:28
Speaker 2: I had contractions for a couple of hours and I
27:31
Speaker 2: was like, what while they were away they know, And
27:35
Speaker 2: it turns out this is a relatively common experience, which
27:38
Speaker 2: is why I also advocate talking to a GP and
27:42
Speaker 2: feeling like not only are you heard, but they aren't,
27:45
Speaker 2: just like a guest dismissive. And what Professor Daniel Maza
27:50
Speaker 2: is really saying is that GPS they don't have the training.
27:54
Speaker 2: But also why bother getting the training if you're not
27:57
Speaker 2: able to charge more? And I'm not saying that they
27:59
Speaker 2: should charge more. There should be a process for this,
28:02
Speaker 2: and the PBS should be picking up some of this
28:04
Speaker 2: cost to insert these things. But it's just not a thing.
28:08
Speaker 2: And I just it blows my mind that when men
28:13
Speaker 2: get anything done, immediately put to sleep, immediately offered a
28:17
Speaker 2: higher dosage of medication. In fact, I was talking to
28:20
Speaker 2: one of my girlfriends who had her wisdom teeth out recently.
28:24
Speaker 2: H and her husband had had his wisdom teeth out
28:27
Speaker 2: take like a year before, and he was like, Oh,
28:29
Speaker 2: it's fine, they'll give you medication. You know, you'll come home.
28:31
Speaker 2: You'll look like a bit of a chipmunk, no worries, worries. Anyway,
28:35
Speaker 2: she went got her wisdom teeth out and then was
28:37
Speaker 2: like at home complaining about the medication that she was taking,
28:40
Speaker 2: and he was like, oh, I think I think she
28:43
Speaker 2: ran out of medication. So he went to find some
28:45
Speaker 2: of his medication that he had been given from the
28:48
Speaker 2: same doctor and he went to get the same medication
28:52
Speaker 2: because he assumed it would be identical. And she had
28:54
Speaker 2: been given ibuprofen, and he had been given codeine because
29:00
Speaker 2: obviously that's all she needed. Sure, same exact procedure, and
29:05
Speaker 2: her husband was given codeine, and she was just given ibuprofen,
29:09
Speaker 2: which you know at the end of the day, if
29:11
Speaker 2: you don't understand those two things, codeine's a lot, a lot,
29:14
Speaker 2: a lot stronger than just ibuprofene, which you can get
29:17
Speaker 2: a culs. Isn't that wild?
29:19
Speaker 4: That is pretty wild, I would say, even slightly insulting
29:23
Speaker 4: to the guy you how to do this?
29:27
Speaker 2: No, actually, I just want all women to be given
29:30
Speaker 2: codine if I think that that pain is going to
29:32
Speaker 2: be too much and be like, oh, women won't need it,
29:35
Speaker 2: like they've gone through worse. Yeah, go through worse every day.
29:39
Speaker 2: You just need a ibuprofen. All right, let's move. Let
29:42
Speaker 2: me tell you about the PBS. So we mentioned earlier
29:44
Speaker 2: about the need for new forms of pills to be
29:46
Speaker 2: included on the PBS, right well, Australian Medical Association Vice
29:50
Speaker 2: President doctor Danielle McCullum agreed and said that the Pharmaceutical
29:54
Speaker 2: Benefits Advisory Committee, which recommends items for the PBS, needs
29:59
Speaker 2: to receive applications from pharmaceutical companies before their products could
30:03
Speaker 2: be listed. She said quote that the Advisory Committee can't
30:08
Speaker 2: compel manufacturers to request listing, which has been a bit
30:12
Speaker 2: of a challenge, but we welcome more contraceptive medications on
30:16
Speaker 2: the PBS. So the inquiry is going to hand down
30:18
Speaker 2: its final report in May, which is quite soon, and
30:21
Speaker 2: I'm probably gonna want to update you guys on what
30:23
Speaker 2: the outcome of that is, just because I think it's
30:25
Speaker 2: really important for our community. But isn't it wild that
30:29
Speaker 2: we're talking about basic human rights here. We're having this
30:32
Speaker 2: conversation about equal access and it not being financially crippling,
30:37
Speaker 2: and it actually just goes back to commercialism, like the
30:41
Speaker 2: company has to apply to be on the PBS, and
30:43
Speaker 2: the company's like, ah, well that doesn't really matter, like
30:46
Speaker 2: food cares, We're still selling the product. Because in my head,
30:49
Speaker 2: and as I said before, I have never applied for
30:52
Speaker 2: a product to be listed on the PBS. But what
30:54
Speaker 2: I'm going to assume is that if something goes on
30:56
Speaker 2: the PBS, it becomes government subsidized. It doesn't change the
31:00
Speaker 2: levels of what the company make it the end of
31:03
Speaker 2: the day. What it would do, though, is subsidize it,
31:06
Speaker 2: which you would think is an incentive to more people
31:10
Speaker 2: buying it. Yes, so they're like, weird, yeahs, we like
31:14
Speaker 2: the best pill. Everybody is going to pay for it
31:17
Speaker 2: regardless because people like you and I if you've had
31:21
Speaker 2: you know, not so great experiences on other ones, You're like,
31:23
Speaker 2: you know what, I don't care it costs me, you know,
31:25
Speaker 2: seventy eight bars. I'm just going to pay it because
31:27
Speaker 2: my health is worth that. And I agree, but that's
31:29
Speaker 2: not fair.
31:30
Speaker 4: It's not fair. It's not fair. That actually kind of
31:33
Speaker 4: takes me down another path. I just want to talk
31:35
Speaker 4: about financial privileged tuisic in it depends what you can afford,
31:39
Speaker 4: but also the cost of your method is the I
31:42
Speaker 4: think you have some general costs to share with us.
31:45
Speaker 4: I can see it over there, and I'm dying to know.
31:47
Speaker 2: Have a little chart of a little chart, guys, I
31:50
Speaker 2: have a graph is polograph. I would call that a table. Yeah,
31:54
Speaker 2: it's from a spreadsheet obviously, guys, I don't know what
31:56
Speaker 2: you expected from me, but it was definitely a spreadsheet,
32:00
Speaker 2: so I have some costs to go through, and I
32:04
Speaker 2: think it's just interesting. I'm not going to read every
32:05
Speaker 2: single one of them, but the emergency contraceptive pill, so
32:09
Speaker 2: that's like the morning after pill or Plan B if
32:12
Speaker 2: you're American. I learned that recently on TikTok and I
32:14
Speaker 2: was like, plan B, what was Plan A? Like, you
32:17
Speaker 2: didn't implement Plan A, so we went for Plan B directly. Anyway, Yeah,
32:20
Speaker 2: I'm curious Pella with a Medicare card only it can
32:23
Speaker 2: be up to fifty bucks. And that is a pill
32:26
Speaker 2: that you can take if you have had unprotected sexual
32:29
Speaker 2: intercourse and you want to prevent a pregnancy. That doesn't
32:32
Speaker 2: do anything for SDIS or STDs, not a thing. It's
32:37
Speaker 2: just to prevent pregnancy. Same with oral contraceptive pills. So
32:41
Speaker 2: obviously these things only prevent pregnancy. They're not protecting you.
32:44
Speaker 2: As we said at the top of the episode, they're
32:46
Speaker 2: not protecting you from SDIS and STDs, which is actually
32:49
Speaker 2: really important to protect yourself against if you're in a
32:52
Speaker 2: new relationship, or if you're in a relationship where you know,
32:55
Speaker 2: maybe you're both having a little bit of fun outside
32:57
Speaker 2: that relationship. But the oral contractive pill with a healthcare
33:01
Speaker 2: card and a Medicare card is going to cost you
33:04
Speaker 2: around six dollars forty if it's listed on the PBS,
33:08
Speaker 2: but with a Medicare card only, it's ten to thirty
33:12
Speaker 2: five dollars. But beck you're going to need to go
33:14
Speaker 2: to the doctor to get that, and a doctor's appointment
33:18
Speaker 2: can go anywhere from zero dollars if it's bog billed,
33:21
Speaker 2: but like basically no one's bog billing anymore, all the
33:24
Speaker 2: way up to one hundred and fifteen dollars per consultation.
33:26
Speaker 2: And you're going to need to do that every three
33:28
Speaker 2: months because you're going to get a three month script.
33:31
Speaker 2: So that's more than four hundred dollars a year in
33:34
Speaker 2: doctor's appointments if you don't have a healthcare card, because
33:38
Speaker 2: I know that a lot of places are going to
33:40
Speaker 2: steal bulk bill for people still with a healthcare card.
33:43
Speaker 2: But again, accessibility of that is becoming lower, And like,
33:48
Speaker 2: what time do you have to go and visit the doctor? Yes,
33:52
Speaker 2: its like it's so wild, it's wild. And do you
33:55
Speaker 2: know what's even more wild is the fact that weekend
33:59
Speaker 2: appointments when I'm a assuming most people who have a
34:01
Speaker 2: nine to five Monday to Friday job, they're more expensive.
34:05
Speaker 2: My doctor's clinic charges a Saturday appointment fee, and it's
34:08
Speaker 2: much more than just a week day fee. But also
34:12
Speaker 2: I can't get to the doctor, you know, in their
34:15
Speaker 2: morning sessions because they start at eight. If I have
34:17
Speaker 2: an eight o'clock appointment at the doctor, you just know
34:20
Speaker 2: that that's not going to happen till like at least
34:21
Speaker 2: eight thirty nine, and then I'm going to be late
34:24
Speaker 2: to work. That impacts my job. If I'm being paid hourly,
34:27
Speaker 2: are we going to take into consideration the hour of
34:29
Speaker 2: pay that I'm not getting for that morning. On the
34:31
Speaker 2: flip side, if I want to do it after hours,
34:34
Speaker 2: most doctors clinics don't do late night appointments every day
34:37
Speaker 2: of the week. Like, let's then throw in the fact
34:39
Speaker 2: that you might have kids a need caring. It just
34:42
Speaker 2: there's so much to it that blows my mind. Moving
34:45
Speaker 2: on though, hormonal, iud so the Marina with a healthcare
34:50
Speaker 2: card and a Medicare card is going to cost you
34:52
Speaker 2: around six dollars forty. With the Medicare only card it's
34:56
Speaker 2: around thirty nine dollars fifty And to get doctor's visit.
35:00
Speaker 2: It's going to cost anywhere between zero and two hundred
35:03
Speaker 2: dollars to be inserted, but that is not taking into
35:07
Speaker 2: consideration any anethetist fees. So as someone who had a
35:11
Speaker 2: marina put in under anesthetic and I also had private healthcare,
35:16
Speaker 2: I was really lucky. But what I had to do
35:18
Speaker 2: was pay the gap. So I was out probably three
35:21
Speaker 2: or four hundred dollars from memory with that just to
35:25
Speaker 2: have it each aspished. So yes, it was thirty nine
35:27
Speaker 2: dollars fifty, but it will depend on your insertion method.
35:30
Speaker 2: And before I was slamming the insertion method of having
35:33
Speaker 2: it done in the clinic, and I'm not sure how
35:35
Speaker 2: much I would recommend that. I mean, they are going
35:37
Speaker 2: to be and like, please do not get in my
35:40
Speaker 2: DMS and message me and be like Victory, I had
35:42
Speaker 2: to put in and I was fine in clinic. Like
35:44
Speaker 2: I get that there are going to be people who
35:46
Speaker 2: have had a brilliant experience and a seamless like insertion
35:51
Speaker 2: of it, right, and you're going to have this perfect
35:53
Speaker 2: experience and you're going to look at my experience and
35:56
Speaker 2: be like that's wild, Victoria. I don't know why you're
35:57
Speaker 2: promoting that. But the experience with my girlfriends that I
36:01
Speaker 2: have anecdotally had is that everyone who has put it
36:05
Speaker 2: in in clinic has had a negative experience. I'm not
36:08
Speaker 2: saying that that's everybody's experience. I'm just talking to my
36:10
Speaker 2: own experience and how traumatic I think that is, and
36:14
Speaker 2: the fact that I got to completely circumvent that by
36:16
Speaker 2: choosing just to go to sleep. I don't know how
36:19
Speaker 2: my body reacted while I was under anesthetic. I don't
36:22
Speaker 2: need to know, Yes, I don't need to know. But
36:24
Speaker 2: what I know is that I got appropriate pain relief
36:27
Speaker 2: and it was put in while I was under right. Yeah,
36:29
Speaker 2: and I think that that is something that should be
36:31
Speaker 2: more accessible. And obviously I got to go down the
36:34
Speaker 2: I guess claiming it on private healthcare. But if you
36:36
Speaker 2: don't have that, it might be an out of product,
36:39
Speaker 2: it might be an out of pocket anesthetic cost. It
36:42
Speaker 2: depends on whether you go to, you know, a general
36:44
Speaker 2: hospital and have it put in, or if you go
36:47
Speaker 2: to a fertility control clinic, which I honestly would recommend
36:50
Speaker 2: going to. They are lovely people and they do this
36:53
Speaker 2: every day. Like at the end of the day, if
36:55
Speaker 2: I'm going to have a Marina put in. Do I
36:57
Speaker 2: want it put in by my GP who just did
36:59
Speaker 2: the training one time and puts it in the clinic
37:02
Speaker 2: and doesn't really do them maybe does a couple of year,
37:05
Speaker 2: Or do I want to go to a fertility control
37:06
Speaker 2: clinic where they do that literally every single day and
37:09
Speaker 2: they're probably like brilliant at the process. It's not to
37:11
Speaker 2: say that GP's bad. They're probably really good. And you
37:14
Speaker 2: know what, there are probably a lot of GPS out
37:16
Speaker 2: there floating around who have become like known for really
37:19
Speaker 2: good insertions of this thing. But from my experience, again,
37:23
Speaker 2: every time I tried to find someone, they would be like,
37:25
Speaker 2: oh no, they don't do that. It was an even
37:27
Speaker 2: bigger nightmare back when I wanted to get it taken out. Oh,
37:31
Speaker 2: I haven't even talked about that yet exactly, because like
37:34
Speaker 2: what goes in must come out at some point mm
37:37
Speaker 2: hmm Newton's laurel as they said, Yeah, what goes up
37:40
Speaker 2: must come down. But when I wanted to get it
37:43
Speaker 2: taken out, that was a circus and a half and
37:44
Speaker 2: I called a whole heap of GPS. And from my understanding,
37:47
Speaker 2: all you had to do was yank the cord. Ah No, oh, no, no, no,
37:52
Speaker 2: we won't go into that story because it is a
37:54
Speaker 2: relatively traumatic story. But it definitely cost me close to
37:56
Speaker 2: one thousand dollars to have that removed, so I think
37:59
Speaker 2: you need to understand I guess that side of cost
38:02
Speaker 2: as well. Obviously, I'm I feel like I'm being relatively
38:05
Speaker 2: ranty today, but it's because I care. I promise, Yeah,
38:08
Speaker 2: that's okay. Copper, IUD same circumstance, but that's going to
38:11
Speaker 2: be more expensive, so it's not going to be able
38:14
Speaker 2: to be claimed under PBS. With a healthcare card doesn't count,
38:18
Speaker 2: but with a Medicare card it could be between seventy
38:21
Speaker 2: and one hundred and twenty dollars, and then it could
38:23
Speaker 2: cost you up to three hundred dollars according to my
38:25
Speaker 2: graph to get it inserted last for ten years though
38:29
Speaker 2: ten year ten days. But again I would probably recommend
38:33
Speaker 2: looking at other insertion methods to make sure that you're okay.
38:36
Speaker 2: The contraceptive implant slash rod right, this is the one
38:40
Speaker 2: that I said, sent me absolutely batty did that for me.
38:45
Speaker 2: I have so many girlfriends who have had I think three, four,
38:49
Speaker 2: even five rods. They love it, they thrive on it.
38:52
Speaker 2: It is the perfect thing for them, and it works
38:55
Speaker 2: really well with a healthcare card around six dollars forty
38:58
Speaker 2: it's pretty good. Yeah, that's around six I sporting with
39:01
Speaker 2: a Medicare card only thirty seven bucks. Okay, And this
39:05
Speaker 2: one you don't need to be put to sleep for
39:06
Speaker 2: because they can just like numb your arm and put
39:08
Speaker 2: it in. It could be up to one hundred and
39:10
Speaker 2: fifteen dollars in the consult fee because most gps have
39:13
Speaker 2: lack an area at their consultation clinic that they can
39:16
Speaker 2: put in. And that lasts three years. That's pretty heavy.
39:20
Speaker 2: That's a nice, happy meeting. That's pretty good. Debra Vira
39:23
Speaker 2: is a contraceptive injection, which I think is really interesting.
39:26
Speaker 2: I've never had this before, but it's around six dollars
39:29
Speaker 2: forty or fifteen bucks with just a Medicare card. You
39:32
Speaker 2: do need a doctor's consultation, so let's call that around
39:36
Speaker 2: one hundred and fifteen dollars. And you're going to need
39:38
Speaker 2: two of these apparently according to this list, and that
39:41
Speaker 2: lasts three months, so just like the pill, you're going
39:44
Speaker 2: to have to return to the doctor for that shot
39:47
Speaker 2: every three months. Again access the vaginal ring. I think
39:52
Speaker 2: do you remember hearing about this. I remember hearing about
39:54
Speaker 2: this when I was much younger thanuverring. It sounds familiar.
39:58
Speaker 2: It's like, basically, I think think it's made of like
40:00
Speaker 2: medical grade silicon and you basically have this ring. That's
40:04
Speaker 2: what would you say about the size of my fingers?
40:06
Speaker 1: Ah?
40:07
Speaker 4: I went around, how would you explain to explain that, Oh,
40:11
Speaker 4: it's a conference of my okay?
40:13
Speaker 2: Notion?
40:14
Speaker 1: Right?
40:15
Speaker 2: Anyway, that billy can ring gets inserted once a month
40:18
Speaker 2: into your vagina and stays in your vagina, okay, And
40:22
Speaker 2: that costs around thirty dollars and then you pull it
40:25
Speaker 2: out after I think it's like twenty five days.
40:27
Speaker 4: Yeah, this must have some benefits to it, because surely
40:31
Speaker 4: no one's opting for this once a month.
40:34
Speaker 2: To do this, well, you put it in once a
40:36
Speaker 2: month and then there was silicon rings stays in your
40:38
Speaker 2: vagina for the entire month. But it's expensive, No, it's
40:42
Speaker 2: not cheap. It's around thirty dollars to have it done.
40:44
Speaker 2: And you need to change that every three weeks. And
40:47
Speaker 2: you can get it on a prescription, so you could
40:49
Speaker 2: probably get it the same way you get the pill
40:50
Speaker 2: and like pick up three of them or whatever. There's Look,
40:53
Speaker 2: I'm not a doctor, and I'm not pretending to be
40:55
Speaker 2: a doctor. I'm just talking about the process. I've said
40:58
Speaker 2: a million times, please go talk to your doctor about this.
41:00
Speaker 2: Don't just talk to your friends like you're just so important.
41:03
Speaker 2: But from my understanding, like the ring has the hormones
41:07
Speaker 2: in the silicon and they seep out, and the way
41:10
Speaker 2: that that works is actually that it's closer to your uterus,
41:13
Speaker 2: so you need less of the hormone than you would
41:15
Speaker 2: if you took it orally. So a couple of my
41:17
Speaker 2: girlfriends have used this. I just find the concept of
41:20
Speaker 2: having something hidden up there for a month. Yeah to me,
41:23
Speaker 2: I'm like, no, thank you. So what you poppet in yourself? Yeap,
41:26
Speaker 2: you poppet in yourself?
41:28
Speaker 1: Yeah?
41:28
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then you leave it in there.
41:30
Speaker 4: I would just never ever ever sleep with anyone ever
41:33
Speaker 4: again instead of doing that.
41:35
Speaker 2: But also that's okay for you too. I reckon there
41:37
Speaker 2: are going to be a heav girls that slide into
41:39
Speaker 2: our dms and they're like, I love my new ring,
41:41
Speaker 2: like the feeling it would ever happened to me, and
41:43
Speaker 2: like I'm assuming, like just assuming here you can't feel it? Yeah, yeah,
41:48
Speaker 2: it's more than a tampon, and if a tampon's inserted properly,
41:51
Speaker 2: like you can't feel that are true?
41:52
Speaker 4: Yeah, maybe it's just like a thing totally. Actually, I've
41:56
Speaker 4: got a lot of questions. Maybe you slide into our
41:57
Speaker 4: DMS because I'm very curious to know what it feels like,
42:00
Speaker 4: what the whole process is, Like.
42:02
Speaker 2: This is too far? Please? What happens if you have sex?
42:05
Speaker 3: Oh?
42:06
Speaker 2: Yeah? Like little? Is it like paying coits a little
42:11
Speaker 2: that game where you throw the rings and then it
42:13
Speaker 2: gets stuck on the pole.
42:18
Speaker 4: You know, like I feel like I'm going to take
42:21
Speaker 4: it too fast.
42:23
Speaker 2: Let's talk about like more barrier methods because obviously those
42:26
Speaker 2: are oral contraceptive methods that only protect against pregnancy.
42:31
Speaker 4: Right.
42:32
Speaker 2: The last one under contraception that you can get from
42:35
Speaker 2: your gp BECK is called a diaphragm, and a diaphragm
42:39
Speaker 2: is basically a barrier method of birth control. And the
42:41
Speaker 2: plan with that one is it's actually like kind of
42:44
Speaker 2: like it looks like a condom that hasn't been unrolled,
42:46
Speaker 2: and it's a little bit bigger, and it basically gets
42:49
Speaker 2: placed over your cervix with sperm side before sex, which
42:54
Speaker 2: is probably less common. But yeah, you place it in
42:57
Speaker 2: before you have sex, and then it's left in place
42:59
Speaker 2: for at least six hours after sex to basically stop
43:02
Speaker 2: the spam getting up your cervix and creating a pregnancy.
43:06
Speaker 5: Right.
43:07
Speaker 2: They do recommend fitting by a health care provider, which
43:10
Speaker 2: I think is really interesting because it's like basically a
43:13
Speaker 2: barrier protection. But that's expensive. It's between seventy and ninety
43:17
Speaker 2: dollars and then obviously again that one hundred and fifteen
43:20
Speaker 2: dollars for a consultation, So I find that wild. You
43:24
Speaker 2: know what I find more wild, though, is when I
43:26
Speaker 2: googled it as well, the one year failure rates around
43:29
Speaker 2: twelve percent with typical use, Like twelve I mean, I
43:34
Speaker 2: don't know what you mean, Like condoms are like ninety
43:37
Speaker 2: nine point ninety five percent effective. Rah, that's like so
43:40
Speaker 2: much less for such a cost. Like understand, no, I'm
43:44
Speaker 2: not going to go and get that one. If you
43:46
Speaker 2: use that, though, please slide into our DMS. We want
43:48
Speaker 2: to hear about it and why you choose that over
43:51
Speaker 2: the other contraceptive like options throughout there. Now, that's what
43:55
Speaker 2: I want to know. Yeah, Like it's not do you
43:57
Speaker 2: use it? That might work? Like surely it can't be
44:01
Speaker 2: oh that was the only method available to me because
44:03
Speaker 2: it's so niche. It does feel a quite niche. But
44:06
Speaker 2: then I guess moving more into barrier methods. Internal female
44:10
Speaker 2: condoms are between three and ten dollars each and their
44:13
Speaker 2: single use. They're much more expensive than external male condoms,
44:18
Speaker 2: which are you know, between zero dollars because lots of
44:20
Speaker 2: them are free to five dollars for multiple and obviously
44:24
Speaker 2: you can buy lots and lots of different kinds. They
44:26
Speaker 2: might even be on sale at coals you don't know,
44:29
Speaker 2: might be in love. I might check it out. And
44:31
Speaker 2: then oral and dental dams. They're not a method of
44:34
Speaker 2: birth control. They only protect from contracting sdis during oral,
44:38
Speaker 2: vaginal or anal sex. They're around three dollars each, so
44:41
Speaker 2: I feel like, given their single use, that's actually relatively expensive.
44:45
Speaker 2: Oh like it adds up, right, I see, like every
44:48
Speaker 2: single time, and I mean every pill. I'm married, so like, huh,
44:52
Speaker 2: it's going to be real cheap for me. But like
44:56
Speaker 2: you know, if you're not married and you have a
44:58
Speaker 2: very active sex life, that's going to add up real quick.
45:01
Speaker 2: It's like getting coffees every day, you know, Like that
45:04
Speaker 2: true adds up.
45:05
Speaker 4: True, Well, coffee back in the day, Yeah, coffee back
45:09
Speaker 4: is a day.
45:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like, it's not three dollars anymore, five dollars fifty
45:12
Speaker 2: for an oat laste the other day. Get this back
45:17
Speaker 2: one dollar extra for oatmelk. Well, now they're taking the
45:21
Speaker 2: piss a little bit, you know, charge me more to
45:23
Speaker 2: save the world. What Well, when you put it like that, Okay,
45:28
Speaker 2: exactly exactly, I'll pay for it. But I'm not happy
45:30
Speaker 2: about it. I'm just not happy about it. But I
45:32
Speaker 2: think it's interesting going through all of those, right totally.
45:36
Speaker 2: And I think it's just interesting just going through all
45:38
Speaker 2: of those and the costs and what they look like
45:41
Speaker 2: and what the actual implementation might be. And I mean
45:45
Speaker 2: back to what we're talking about before. I don't know
45:47
Speaker 2: how many times I can reiterate this. Please go talk
45:50
Speaker 2: to your doctor about this, because we're not doctors. We're
45:52
Speaker 2: just talking about the costs of these things. And these
45:55
Speaker 2: things work very differently for very different people. And to
45:59
Speaker 2: be honest, there might be a few types of contraception
46:01
Speaker 2: that you've heard about today that you're like, fat, I
46:03
Speaker 2: didn't know that existed. Like, how many people are going
46:05
Speaker 2: to be listening to this and They're like a ring
46:07
Speaker 2: that you put in your vagina for a whole month.
46:10
Speaker 2: What Like that's crazy to some people, And that's cool
46:14
Speaker 2: that we're learning together, But the best person to learn
46:16
Speaker 2: from is actually going to be your GP GPP baby
46:20
Speaker 2: fertility specialists that can help you through these processes and
46:24
Speaker 2: actually find what the right fit for you is, because,
46:27
Speaker 2: as we've said before, the right fit for me is
46:29
Speaker 2: not the right fit for you, and the right fit
46:30
Speaker 2: for Beck is not the right fit for me. Like different,
46:33
Speaker 2: everybody is different now totally what makes our community so cool? Yeah,
46:37
Speaker 2: I love that.
46:38
Speaker 4: I think that we are ending in on a really
46:39
Speaker 4: good note. But a few takeaways from today. My one
46:43
Speaker 4: that I'm most scared of right now, and I keep
46:46
Speaker 4: hearing this, many clinics aren't bulk billing anymore.
46:49
Speaker 1: Why?
46:50
Speaker 4: When?
46:50
Speaker 1: How?
46:51
Speaker 2: What the hell does that mean? There's not a lot
46:53
Speaker 2: I can say on that, but essentially, I think it's
46:57
Speaker 2: just the rising cost of living. And I mean, at
47:00
Speaker 2: the end of the day, I'm not here. I think
47:02
Speaker 2: some people are going to cut me down for this.
47:04
Speaker 2: But doctors have to put food on their tables too.
47:06
Speaker 2: They still have to pay rent of their clinics, They
47:08
Speaker 2: have to pay their nurses, they have to pay their
47:10
Speaker 2: admin staff. They have mouths to feed and bills to pay,
47:13
Speaker 2: and I think that it's just become a financial pressure
47:16
Speaker 2: where they just don't have an option, like they need
47:19
Speaker 2: to know increase how much they're being paid. And our
47:22
Speaker 2: government isn't subsidizing our health care enough for them to
47:25
Speaker 2: not do that, because we all know that. I think
47:28
Speaker 2: at the crux of it, if you sat a doctor
47:30
Speaker 2: down and said why did you become a doctor? It's
47:32
Speaker 2: not because I wanted to get rich. There are way
47:34
Speaker 2: easier ways to get rich than becoming a doctor. They
47:37
Speaker 2: become a doctor because they care about people and want
47:39
Speaker 2: to help, and usually that is the situation. So I
47:42
Speaker 2: genuinely feel like if a doctor is charging, it's probably
47:46
Speaker 2: because they have to not feel like, oh, do you
47:48
Speaker 2: know what I really want to do. I don't want
47:50
Speaker 2: people to be able to access really financially responsible health
47:55
Speaker 2: care like they're not doing that. We know they're not
47:57
Speaker 2: doing that. I think that the government needs to stay
48:00
Speaker 2: been a bit more than they have been before and
48:02
Speaker 2: actually subsidized it a bit more because you know, you
48:04
Speaker 2: look at the rising cost of living and it's like
48:06
Speaker 2: up to seven percent what has the government increased how
48:09
Speaker 2: much that they're subsidizing healthcare by seven percent? No, they haven't,
48:13
Speaker 2: but things are costing more than seven percent. I guarantee
48:16
Speaker 2: admin staff in the doctor's surgeries are going, oh well,
48:18
Speaker 2: I'd like a raise because the rising cost of living exists. Yes,
48:22
Speaker 2: like it makes sense. We know, you know, landlords are
48:25
Speaker 2: charging more now because they're trying to cover their mortgages,
48:27
Speaker 2: which is an entirely other conversation. But people own clinics
48:31
Speaker 2: and they're probably increasing the rent on the clinic. Like,
48:34
Speaker 2: there's just a lot of things to be taken into consideration.
48:37
Speaker 2: And I can almost guarantee that clinics aren't not bulk
48:42
Speaker 2: filling anymore because they want to screw us over. Sure, Okay,
48:45
Speaker 2: that does that make sense? That makes sense. It makes
48:47
Speaker 2: me feel bit better actually.
48:48
Speaker 4: And the last point that I think I'm going to
48:50
Speaker 4: take away from this, and I feel like everyone should,
48:52
Speaker 4: is that the cost that we're talking about today is
48:56
Speaker 4: mainly for metropolitan people.
48:58
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's true.
49:00
Speaker 4: We're not really kind of discussing what the cost is
49:04
Speaker 4: for rural and regional people that you know, might not
49:08
Speaker 4: have the same accessibility as we do.
49:10
Speaker 2: I can imagine being quite difficult, and it's a privilege.
49:13
Speaker 2: Like as I said before, I got to go down
49:16
Speaker 2: to the fertility clinic and you know, decide to have
49:18
Speaker 2: my marina inserted there. What if you're in a rural
49:21
Speaker 2: town and you only have the GP and that GPS
49:25
Speaker 2: not trained in that type of contraception that you want.
49:28
Speaker 2: Not only do you not have access to that, but
49:30
Speaker 2: you might also be a bit wary of getting that
49:33
Speaker 2: because you're not going to have the support close to
49:35
Speaker 2: you if that's not the right contraceptive method and you
49:37
Speaker 2: need to have it taken out. So I think there's, yeah,
49:39
Speaker 2: there's a lot of privilege when talking about contraception, and
49:42
Speaker 2: this conversation shouldn't stop here, which is why we have
49:44
Speaker 2: our Facebook group so we can continue the conversations and
49:48
Speaker 2: continue to I guess hear your opinions and you know,
49:51
Speaker 2: hear what our community is going through, so the conversation
49:55
Speaker 2: will continue over there. But I just think it's this
49:58
Speaker 2: has been such a small snippet of the issue that
50:00
Speaker 2: we're going through, and I guess the crux of this
50:02
Speaker 2: episode wasn't necessarily to talk about accessibility, even though we
50:06
Speaker 2: are shedding lash on it. Right now it's really to
50:08
Speaker 2: talk about the cost of it and what that looks like,
50:11
Speaker 2: and that contraception I think is important to talk about.
50:15
Speaker 2: And I'm sure a lot of you thought we were
50:16
Speaker 2: going to talk about who should be paying for it.
50:18
Speaker 2: We covered that on that Friday Drinks episode. But what
50:21
Speaker 2: is it actually at the depths of it. What's it
50:24
Speaker 2: going to cost me to get on the pill? What's
50:26
Speaker 2: it going to cost me to buy cornum?
50:28
Speaker 4: Totally?
50:29
Speaker 2: I love it. Let's leave it at that. I reckon,
50:31
Speaker 2: Let's get on your tea. Let's go get another tea.
50:33
Speaker 2: All right, Well, we love you, has a good weekend.
50:35
Speaker 2: We will see you guys on Friday. Bye, guys.
50:44
Speaker 5: The advice sheared on She's on the Money is generally
50:47
Speaker 5: nature and does not consider your individual circumstances. She's on
50:51
Speaker 5: the Money exists purely for educational purposes and should not
50:55
Speaker 5: be relied upon to make an investment or financial decision.
50:58
Speaker 5: If you do choose to buy a financial product, read
51:00
Speaker 5: the PDS TMD and obtain appropriate financial.
51:03
Speaker 2: Advice tailored towards your needs.
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51:09
Speaker 5: of Money.
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