It can be simultaneously true that:
1) hormonal birth control side effects are often ignored; medical sexism is real
2) the J&J shot should be paused for information-gathering on potential risk factors
3) blood clots are bad & scary even when non-fatal, but the J&J ones could be

I'm not a public health person so I can't wade into the science but as someone who spends a lot of time thinking about messaging, this moment is being taken as an opportunity to shout out how bad hormonal BC is (& not even for the best reasons it's bad!) which makes it way worse!

Comparing hormonal BC (widely used for decades & overwhelmingly safe) to a new pharmaceutical product whose approval was fast-tracked for emergency use/dissemination is not doing what you think it's doing! It's instead playing into anti-vax & anti-abortion talking points!

Not to mention, a woman died and another is in critical condition. It's a bit fucked up to them, & not to mention to the women of color on whom the original BC formulas were tested on decades ago, to conflate these issues. We have the time and space to get the messaging right.

Me and @KaraMailman wrote about how anti-vax and anti-abortion rhetoric come from the same playbook a bit ago for @reproaction. Give it a read! https://reproaction.org/anti-vaccine-and-anti-abortion/