Many Republican Politicians, including Vice President Mike Pence, have decided to weave a fake narrative to sell their ideologies on abortion to the public. Planned Parenthood is one of the largest health care providers for low income Americans in need of preventive care and services such as contraceptives, sexually transmitted disease testing and cancer screenings. Planned Parenthood is more than a place for a woman to receive abortions, like many would like people to believe. Infact, Planned Parenthood provides a number of important preventive services to both women and men of all ages.
Furthermore there is already a law in place that prevents federal money from going towards abortions (except in dire cases such as rape or if health issues get in the way).
Many people don’t seem to have a proper understanding of how Planned Parenthood is funded. This program is not directly funded by the federal government. Instead, Planned Parenthood receives reimbursements from Medicaid for preventive care. These programs help pay for preventive care and medical expenses to patients that otherwise couldn’t afford these essential services. It’s estimated that these clinics prevent 579,000 unintended pregnancies each year. Just like any sort of health coverage, Medicaid reimburses the clinic for their health services. There is no allotted amount of funding handed down from the federal government.
A study published by the Journal of Adolescent Health found that there was a significant drop in sex education given to teenagers including topics such as, birth control, abortion, STDs, and preventive care in general. There has been a 70 percent drop in education to teen girls about birth control and a 61 percent drop in education for males about birth control, according to The Journal. Planned Parenthood provides many useful education opprotunities for teenageres, such as classes and a section meant for teenagers on their website. Without Planned Parenthood many teenagers wouldn’t have access to comprehensive sex education.
According to The New York Times, 58 percent of student’s between the grades of 7 and 12 experience sexual assault from peers, These could include either verbal or physical types of sexual harassment or assault. Preventive care is instrumental in cases such as these where students can be taught how to protect themselves from these sort of attacks or even to not sexually assault or harass anyone in the first place.
Republicans foolishly believe that defunding Planned Parenthood will keep women from getting abortions while the truth of the matter is that women will go to dangerous and potentially lethal extents to terminate unwanted pregnancies. Every year 21.6 million women worldwide have an unsafe abortion, according to the World Health Organization about 47,000 women die from unsafe abortion complications. Republicans are now beginning to chip away at the rights to a safe abortion in the United States. Many states now require waiting periods, mandatory ultrasounds basically trying to scare women away from decisions some fat middle aged man on capitol hill happens to agree with.
The future for women in the United States could be similar to women from the 66 other countries, many of which are developing nations, in which women have no access to safe abortions. Banning abortions is not a pro life movement it’s the farthest thing from – it’s anti choice and anti human rights.
Instead of listening to the rhetoric and ideologies of over paid, sell-out politicians, it’s time to get the facts straight about not only abortion but Planned Parenthood, and the importance of preventive care. The 2.5 million people who rely on Planned Parenthood annually deserve low cost care and access to affordable treatments if need be. Pro-life politicians, ironically seems to care very little about the lives that rely on Planned Parenthood.
