What do the different colors in a birth control pill mean?
The different colours helps to tell which pills contain hormones (the “active pills”) and which pills do not contain hormones (“sugar pills”). If you use a pill that varies the amount of hormones that you are taking from week to week (for example, Triphasil, Triquilar, Tri-Cyclen, Tri-Cyclen Lo), the different colour pills correspond to different amounts of hormone. If you use a pill that contains the same amount of hormones from week to week (for example MinEstrin, Alesse, Marvelon, Cyclen, Yasmin), the one colour of pill represents the pills that contain the active hormones, while the other colour represents the pills that contain no hormones (the placebo pills or “sugar pills”). Birth control pills come in either a 21-day or a 28-day pack. Packs with 28 pills have 21 pills that contain hormones (active pills) and 7 pills that contain no medication (placebo or sugar pills). Packs with 21 pills only have 21 active pills. When using 21-pill packs, women have to remember to start taking
