Misinformed Consent: Hormonal Contraception Part 2

June 21, 2026

The focus of Part 1 was how misinformation or incomplete education in informed consent can have life-altering consequences. The issues of when life begins, how hormonal contraception influences the beginning of life, and the necessity of protecting the dignity of the human person were discussed. Part II focuses on hormonal contraception and its potential risks to enable women to make fully informed decisions.

Studies are revealing that the interaction with the immune system, autoimmunity, and proinflammatory states are factors for many chronic diseases.

In 2023, UCLA published an article showing that hormonal contraception increased cortisol and proinflammatory cytokines TNF-alpha and IL-6 (1). This same article also showed that women on hormonal contraception rated their mood as lower and had higher subjective stress levels in response to a social stressor (1).

In 2017, a study published in the European Journal of Contraception and Reproductive Health Care found that women with pre-existing depression, eating disorders or anxiety had worsened symptoms on combined oral contraceptives (2). In 2022, the Department of Neuroscience at Carleton University published a study on increased anxiety, depression, and stress scores of women on hormonal contraception (3). This same article found increases in both cortisol and CRP in women taking hormonal contraception (3). In 2017, an article on how the hypothalamic pituitary axis is modified such that there is an increase in cortisol production as well as a decrease in hippocampal size was observed in women taking hormonal contraception (4). This is important to understand as the function of a hippocampus is broad, with roles in memory formation and consolidation, spatial navigation, and is an integral part of the limbic system, the source of our emotional behaviors (5).

For over thirty years, there has been an understanding that hormonal contraception increases rates of breast cancer, a risk which reduces after cessation of taking hormonal contraception (6). In 2017, a prospective study found the increased risk of breast cancer to be up to 60%, depending upon the type of hormonal contraception used (7). In 2007, The Lancet published review data on tens of thousands of women, finding that rates of cervical cancer were increased in women taking hormonal contraception (8).

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