In 2018, the Guttmacher Institute turned 50—that’s half a century of advancing sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR)! To celebrate, we reflected on some of our most important data in the video below and revisited our history in our 50 Years of Impact timeline, which covers 1968­–2018. We encourage you to watch the video and explore the timeline for snapshots of our work and impact.
 

Throughout its history, Guttmacher has been a catalyst for positive change in the field of SRHR, in the United States and globally. The Institute has:

• Provided critical data to support the creation of Title X, the U.S. national family planning program
• Prompted the passage of state laws ensuring minors’ access to confidential reproductive health care
• Contributed to the spread of state-level comprehensive sex education programs
• Promoted the issue of fully funded insurance coverage for contraceptive care
• Provided the evidence base for the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive coverage guarantee
• Mobilized billions of dollars in global aid to support contraceptive services in low- and middle-income countries
• Prompted many countries to liberalize their abortion laws and make safe abortion services more widely available, by documenting the impact of unsafe abortion around the world
• Enabled countless organizations and government agencies to understand where reproductive health services are most needed and the impact of meeting those needs, thereby contributing to the development of innumerable programs and interventions around the globe
• Informed the clinical care provided by thousands of health care providers in the United States and around the world by documenting contraceptive failure rates and other clinically relevant data

For a more in-depth historical look, you can find a complete collection of the Institute’s work in the Sophia Smith Archive at Smith College.

The Institute publishes a broad range of reports, fact sheets, policy analyses and other resources that have provided the evidence base to promote effective and evidence-driven policies and programs worldwide. Through 2020, Guttmacher also published two peer-reviewed journals, Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health and International Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health. In addition, our research has been published in a wide range of peer-reviewed journals, including such well-regarded and influential publications as the American Journal of Public Health, BJOG, Contraception, Demography, Health Policy and Planning, JAMA, the Journal of Adolescent Health, The Lancet, Lancet Global Health, the New England Journal of Medicine, Population and Development Review and Studies in Family Planning.