Brandeis students will not be directly affected by the recently raised price of prescription birth control at campus health centers this fall, a University nurse said. Time magazine online reported this summer that brand name prescriptions on many college campuses have increased in price from $8 to $10 per month to $30 to $50 per month. University Nurse Practitioner Sioban McLaughlin said that the Brandeis Health Center, however, does not dispense pills directly. It only provides the prescriptions to be filled at a pharmacy.

"Because we're not licensed as a pharmacy, we can't make those kinds of deals [with companies that produce birth control]," McLaughlin said.

Due to the federal Deficit Reduction Act of 2005, an act that deals with the provision of early childhood preventive and services in Medicaid, as of this January it became expensive for pharmaceutical companies to offer large discounts on birth control to colleges, as they had in the past. Many school health centers have stockpiled enough birth control to delay price changes, but students will start feeling the effects of the law now, according to Time magazine.

"I do hear people complain about the price of birth control," McLaughlin said. "I think it's been a steady increase in price over the years."

Birth control is covered by most health insurance plans, McLaughlin said, but for those who don't want to involve insurance companies in the process, Planned Parenthood, which offers birth control at discounted prices, is also an option.

"Because most people have insurance, co-payments go up over the years," adding to the expense, McLaughlin said.

McLaughlin said she hasn't seen a change in the number of students coming to the Health Center to receive birth control prescriptions.

Companies are seeing an increase in the purchase of Plan B, an emergency contraceptive also known as the "morning after pill," though they aren't certain if this is directly connected to the prescription birth control price increase, Time reported. Women can take Plan B up to 120 hours after having sex.

The Brandeis Health Center offers Plan B for $20, and it is also offered over the counter at pharmacies.

"It's always been pretty well known-about on campus," McLaughlin said. Students regularly purchase this drug, she said, but she hasn't seen any variations in recent years.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison health center, however, now sees students buying Plan B every day instead of just once a week, according to Wisconsin-Madison managing Health Center Pharmacist Jason Walker Crawford. Health centers at schools such as Bowdoin College have decided to stop offering birth control pills, which previously was free for students, though they still offer Plan B for free.