This chapter considers the efforts that zoos have made to establish cooperative breeding programmes to create insurance populations of threatened species in zoos, such as the establishment of international studbooks, the EAZA Ex-situ Programmes (EEPs) in Europe and the Species Survival Plan® (SSP) programmes in North America. To improve breeding in some species a number of assisted reproductive technologies have been developed, including artificial insemination, cloning and frozen zoos. In order to manage genetic diversity and prevent the effects of inbreeding, some animals may need to be culled or given contraception. Population growth in managed populations has been predicted by using computer simulations. Some species have recovered well in the wild without the need for ex-situ breeding programmes.

No western country experienced as protracted a debate on contraception as Ireland. The longstanding ban on contraception has commonly been seen as the consequence of Catholic church teaching and the near-universal religious observance by Irish Catholics. But the Irish debate went far beyond Catholic teaching. The merits of large families and the laws banning contraception (as well as prohibition of divorce and abortion) came to be seen as a symbol of Ireland’s national identity; the Irish approach to contraception was intimately bound up with ideas of Irishness. The logic of opposition to the use of contraception shifted over the decades. Initially, the belief that ‘artificial’ contraception was contrary to the teaching of the Catholic church was the engine that drove state policy and broader opposition. By the 1970s this argument was being abandoned, in favour of claims that permitting contraception would destroy the fabric of the family and society. The battle to protect Irish society from the “menace” of contraception, abortion and divorce continued into the present century in the face of falling fertility, many single mothers, and a significant abortion trail to Britain.

What can a model of continence based in male physiology have to offer female writers? This chapter argues that the strong opinions that Vernon Lee expressed about sex and its relation to art in her early writing should not be dismissed as the result of repression or parental indoctrination, as they have been by previous critics. Lee, like Johnson, combined Paterian sensuous continence with other nineteenth-century discourses, particularly discussions of sexual health by New Women writers, and the result is central to her theorizing about life, social ethics, and art. She insisted on the harmfulness of sex to both individuals and society, and that those who felt otherwise were suffering from ‘logical misconception’. But Lee was also an aesthete, for whom sensuous experience was extremely important. She worried that continent aestheticism would limit an aesthete’s experience and lead to solipsism and waste. Her answer was a Paterian disciplined love, a reaching out to what is unhealthy and corrupt, whether people, places, or artworks, and learning to filter the good from the bad, to ‘cleanse and recreate it in the fire of intellectual and almost abstract passion’.

This chapter shows that following the introduction of the Family Planning Act, very little changed in relation to access to contraception. Individuals were still reliant on a sympathetic doctor and a chemist that would stock contraceptives. Moreover, into the 1980s and 1990s, class, location, and age had a significant impact on access. As the case of tubal ligation shows, the UK continued to be relied upon for Irish women’s reproductive healthcare. This chapter argues that direct challenges to the law by activists such as Condom Sense and the IFPA youth group highlighted the problems with the law and ultimately helped to act as a catalyst for its liberalisation in 1993.

From the late 1960s to late 1970s, a number of family planning clinics were established across the country. This chapter explores the experiences of activists involved in these clinics, the personal risks they took and their motivations for involvement. The importance of national and international networks is explored. The demand for the clinics across the country shows that many Irish men and women were beginning to exercise their own agency in relation to their reproductive choices. The stories of these family planning clinics, also show the importance of medical authority and how the medical model was seen to legitimise the work they were doing, but also enabled the clinics to provide a wider range of family planning options. While the groups ultimately did not succeed in broadening contraceptive access to a wide range of socioeconomic classes, they played a significant role in the liberalisation of family planning law in 1970s Ireland and opening up debates on the issue.

The conclusion sums up the key findings of the book as well as its contemporary relevance. It also points to avenues for future research.

This chapter highlights the profound influence of the legal and religious context on individuals’ choices around family planning in the early twentieth century. Individuals’ accounts suggest that their parents lacked knowledge of contraception and complied with Church teachings. Yet, the documentation of court cases relating to contraception in the Irish press, and letters from Irish men and women to Marie Stopes complicates this picture and suggests a tension between what oral history respondents think about their parents’ reproductive health experiences and the lived realities of men and women of fertile age in early post-independent Ireland. This chapter provides clear evidence of resistance and attempts at resistance. In addition, the letters from Irish men and women to Marie Stopes suggest that many Irish men and women perceived a lack of access to birth control as having a negative impact on both maternal and infant health.

This chapter builds on important recent accounts of the contraceptive pill in other predominantly Catholic countries with similar restrictions in place. It focuses on three key themes: firstly, contemporary attitudes to the contraceptive pill in Ireland in the 1960s and 1970s; the experiences of Irish women who chose to take the contraceptive pill; and, the role of medical authority surrounding the pill. The chapter shows that through negotiating access to the contraceptive pill, Irish women were also negotiating both their marriage dynamics and relationships with the medical profession. Ultimately, the loophole regarding the prescription of the contraceptive pill as a cycle regulator in the period before 1979 placed Irish general practitioners in a position of significant power over women’s access to contraception.

The introduction provides a broad overview of the history of contraception and sexuality in Ireland from the formation of the Irish Free State while situating the book’s key arguments within the wider international historiography and outlining the social, religious and cultural context. A detailed explanation of the methodology and the value of utilising first-hand accounts and oral history interviews in order to uncover the history of contraception in Ireland is also provided.

By the 1970s, younger generations of Irish men and women were beginning to question the Church’s teachings in relation to contraception, and many others were exhibiting resistance in their contraceptive practices. It is evident, however, that for the older generations, Church teachings had a significant impact on their family planning choices, often resulting in guilt and shame if individuals chose to use contraception. Although it is clear that the encyclical Humanae Vitae caused considerable anguish for some members of the priesthood, speaking out against papal teachings could have significant consequences. Many priests toed the line and the confession box was an important sphere where priests could continue to exert power over women’s family planning choices. Yet, it is clear that some priests were also beginning to follow their own consciences, and used the confession box compassionately to assist individuals who were troubled by their decision to use contraception.

This chapter highlights how, in the absence of legal access to artificial methods, natural methods of family planning, in particular calendar-based methods remained popular, particularly for couples who were born in the 1930s and 1940s. In addition, for many couples, having children was an accepted part of marriage; contraceptive methods only tended to be used after participants had already had children in order to ‘space’ subsequent pregnancies, or in order to ‘stop’ pregnancies following the completion of the family. In contrast to Ireland, visions of England as a ‘permissive’ society persisted well into the twentieth century. The chapter also seeks to explore the dynamics of decision-making around family planning in the period, illustrating how women began to exhibit more agency around these choices, and that contraception was generally seen as a female responsibility. It will also illuminate the impact that lack of access to artificial contraception had on individuals.

This chapter explores the contraception campaigns of feminist groups in the 1970s including the Irish Women’s Liberation Movement, Irishwomen United and the Contraception Action Programme. It places the activities of these groups within the wider historiography of feminist health activism. Drawing primarily on oral history interviews with former members and feminist magazines, newspaper sources and the Roisin Conroy/Attic Press Archive, this chapter illuminates the personal experiences of Irish feminist activists. It illuminates the personal experiences of Irish feminist activists and illustrate the nuances of feminist demands for reproductive rights within the Irish case study. Moreover, as well as service provision, later groups such as IWU and CAP drew attention to the important class and geographic inequalities with regard to access to contraception in Ireland.

A 27-year-old primigravida at 11+1 weeks’ gestation by menstrual dating presents for her first visit for routine prenatal care, accompanied by her husband. While discussing the comprehensive medical history with you before you meet the couple, your obstetric trainee mentions that the patient is allergic to penicillin.

During your overnight call duty, a 37-year-old G2P1 with a spontaneous pregnancy presents to the obstetrics emergency assessment unit of your tertiary center at 32+3 weeks’ gestation with pruritis preventing her from sleep. She has no obstetric complaints; cardiotocography initiated upon the patient’s presentation shows a normal fetal heart tracing and uterine quiescence.

A 38-year-old G7P7 is referred by her primary care provider to your high-risk obstetrics clinic for preconception consultation after having angiography and percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) in your tertiary center for a non-ST elevation myocardial infarction (NSTEMI) 18 months ago. All her children, the youngest aged four years, were delivered vaginally at term prior to emigrating from Africa.

A patient is referred by her primary care provider for consultation and transfer of care to your high-risk obstetric unit at a tertiary center. She is a 32-year-old primigravida at 15+3 weeks’ gestation with new abnormalities on chest X-ray and a positive sputum smear for acid-fast bacilli, performed as part of investigations for a four-week history of cough and night sweats. You have arranged to see her at the end of your clinic, with appropriate infection precautions. Referral to an infectious disease expert has also been instigated. A copy of the routine maternal prenatal investigations is unavailable at this time. First-trimester sonogram and aneuploidy screen were unremarkable. She has no obstetric complaints.

A 30-year-old nulligravida with epilepsy is referred by her primary care provider to your hospital center’s high-risk obstetrics unit for preconception counseling.

A 29-year-old primigravida with sickle cell anemia (SCA) is referred by her primary care provider to your tertiary center’s high-risk obstetrics unit for prenatal care of a sonographically confirmed single viable intrauterine pregnancy at 8+2 weeks’ gestation. She has no obstetric complaints.

A 28-year-old nulligravida with known factor V Leiden mutation is referred by her primary care provider to your hospital center’s high-risk obstetrics unit for preconception counseling.