72-year-old Barbara Seaman, a pioneer in the health of women, died of lung cancer at her home in Manhattan, New York.
Seaman is best known for citing many of the risks associated with the birth control pill.
In her first book, “The Doctors’ Case Against the Pill,” Seaman exposed the serious and little-known side effects of the high-estrogen pill prescribed at the time. Women weren’t warned that the pill could cause heart attacks, strokes, depression and a host of other ills.
As a result of the hearings, birth control pills were required to carry a printed warning that discussed risks in general and clotting disorders in particular. These days, the pill contains far less estrogen than in the past.
She founded the National Women’s Health Network in 1975.
She wrote many other books including “Free and Female” The Sex Life of the Contemporary Woman,” “The Greatest Experiment Ever Performed on Women: Exploding the Estrogen Myth,” “Lovely Me: The Life of Jacquelin Susann.”
She was the first true advocate for female reproductive health.