The present situation Contraception Young men and women nowadays often live together for several years without intending to start a family. They want to complete their education and find a job before they have their children. Modern contraception is widely used both for limiting the number of children and for timing childbearing, mainly to postpone the first child. In 1965 the mean age for first births was 23, and 20 years later it was 26. The Pill and condom are the chief methods before childbearing period, while IUD is most common among those who have completed their families.
Contraceptive services are easily accessible and free of charge in the health services.
Oral contraceptives, injectables or emergency hormonal contraceptives must be prescribed by a physician or a midwife, and, like other prescribed drugs, they are subsidized. Condoms and spermicides are bought by the users at market price. The annual number of abortions over the past twenty years has been between 30,000 and 35,000, and the abortion rate for women of fertile age around 20 per thousand. The percentage of abortion in relation to all known pregnancies has fluctuated between 20 and 25 percent. Given the present fertility and abortion rates, a Swedish woman will on average have two children and 0.6 abortions during her reproductive life.