Nearly a third of people using over-the-counter birth control pills previously used nothing, study finds

Two years after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the first over-the-counter birth control pill , new research is looking at who's switching to it and why.

In the study, published Monday in JAMA Network Open , researchers used survey data from 986 people, ages 15 to 45, in 44 states who obtained the over-the-counter pill either online or at a pharmacy. They found that a significant portion of users shifted to the over-the-counter pill from a less-effective method of birth control or from using no contraception at all.

Of those surveyed, they found a 31.8 percentage point increase in use by people who previously used no contraceptive method. A 41 percentage point increase was seen in those who switched from a less-effective method, like condoms or emergency contraceptio