Today’s Solutions: April 19, 2025

Emergency contraception, like Plan B, can prevent pregnancy if taken within 72 hours of having unprotected sex. It has been available without a prescription for people above 18 since 2006, and it’s been available to people of all ages without an ID since 2013. But in some pharmacies, emergency contraception is still kept behind the counter, which can be a major hurdle for anyone who feels awkward or anxious about purchasing the pill. The barriers to access are even higher for people who live in a place where pharmacists can refuse access to emergency contraception as they see fit. For students on isolated college campuses, distance is an additional hurdle, which is why an engineer at Stanford University helped develop a high-tech vending machine that allows students to confidentially get access to emergency contraception (and condoms) at any hour of the day. With the installation of the contraception-selling vending machine, a national conversation has sparked about normalizing emergency contraception to make it more readily accessible. Since the machine’s debut in 2017, many universities around America have installed or have plans to install these vending machines.

Solutions News Source Print this article
More of Today's Solutions

Happiness and well-being expert shares what actually makes a happier life

Happiness and well-being researcher and author of A Journey for Happiness: The Man Who Cycled to Bhutan Christopher Boyce spent years studying what makes ...

Read More

TEMPO Satellite: Harnessing air pollution data to combat environmental injustice

Air pollution is a major hazard to public health in the United States. Pollutants like nitrogen oxide, sulfur dioxide, ground-level ozone, and fine particles ...

Read More

Tips for surviving unexpected disasters: What is a “go-bag” and h...

Sherri McKinney, the Red Cross' national spokesman, has firsthand experience with the unpredictability of natural disasters. McKinney, who escaped the tornadoes in Nashville in ...

Read More

Making windows bird-friendly: a crash course on protecting our feathered friends

In 1990, Michael Mesure was on the way to a wildlife rehabilitation center. Among his passengers was a common yellowthroat, a colorful warbler that ...

Read More