Cutting More Than Costs

In troubled times, vasectomies snip and prosper

"(CNN) -- Dr. J. Stephen Jones had seven vasectomies to perform in a day.
The schedule for Jones, a Cleveland, Ohio, urologist, has become more crowded during a recent boom in vasectomies.
"My staff came to me and said, what's happening?" said Jones, the chairman of the Department of Regional Urology of Glickman Urological and Kidney Institute at the Cleveland Clinic. "Why are we suddenly having an explosion in guys asking for vasectomies?"
They looked at their statistics and realized the uptick started around November as the economic crisis deepened. October went down in the history books as one of Wall Street's worst months.
Since then, the Cleveland Clinic has seen a 50 percent increase in vasectomies, an outpatient surgery that is the cheapest form of permanent birth control. Vasectomies are less invasive and cheaper than tubal ligation, which involves blocking, tieing or cutting a woman's fallopian tubes to prevent pregnancy."
"Jones was told by patients that they were getting vasectomies because they were losing their jobs and health insurance, or concerned about being out of work soon."