Following the great losses of the First World War, all birth control means and their promotion had been banned in 1920 to ensure population growth.
[2] In 1965, legalization of oral contraception was discussed by François Mitterrand during that year's presidential election, which shocked General Charles de Gaulle.
This commission brought in various institutions, associations, and scientists including Jacques Monod, François Jacob, Alfred Sauvy and Pierre Bourdieu.
Proponents for creating limits for contraceptive prescriptions noted the existing requirement on the practice of therapeutic abortion, where the opinion of three doctors was necessary.
Formally proposed during the spring of 1967,[6] the Neuwirth Law, or the loi relative à la régulation des naissances et abrogeant les articles L. 648 et L. 649 du code de la santé publique,[8] as approved by the joint committee, was passed with left-wing support[1] on 19 December 1967.
The relative executive decrees were blocked by the conservative government, notably Jean Foyer, then minister for Health, some as late as 1974.