“Care. No matter what.” That is the slogan for Planned Parenthood and the kind of message I like to hear when it comes to my health and well-being. Alas, we live in a world where we just can’t have nice things.
Scott Walker recently signed legislation that cuts the amount of public money that goes to Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin while directing millions of state and federal dollars to other “less controversial” health care providers. Walker signed the two bills at Life’s Connection, a women’s health clinic in Waukesha that helps promote abortion alternatives.
The first bill inhibits Wisconsin from passing along federal family-planning grant money under Title X to any organization that provides abortions.
The second puts a limit on how much Planned Parenthood can receive as reimbursement for prescription drugs.
Together that is about $8 million annually that will no longer be provided to Planned Parenthood.
While Walker makes Planned Parenthood out to be some back-alley abortion shack instead of a morally sound institute, he is failing to see what he is actually cutting funding to.
Walker has said previously that while he’s pro-life, he believes having an abortion is up to the woman and her doctor. He also said that he wants women to be safe and well-informed.
This is possibly the most hypocritical thing I’ve ever heard from a Politian.
I never had a sex talk from my parents growing up. The school system was no better. I remember my teacher having to dedicate half a class to teaching how to correctly spell “abstinence.”
The Planned Parenthood website has resources and educational content on it that I definitely could have used growing up and definitely do use now.
Not only do they have information on the services they provide such as to birth control, cancer screenings, pregnancy testing, and STD and HIV testing and treatment; they provide information on sexual orientation & gender, relationships, body image, and even men’s sexual health.
Four years after other funding cuts were made to Planned Parenthood, five rural clinics were closed down that provided birth control and health screenings but not abortions. Abortion is only 2.3 percent of the services they offer.
Not only is Walker restricting access to abortion even in cases of rape and incest, but he’s denying a company money that provides birth control. You know, the thing you use to keep from getting pregnant in the first place. By trying to eliminate all access to abortion, women who seek one will be forced to go to an actual back-alley abortion shack.
UW-Milwaukee is blessed with the Norris Health Center, and that’s great for us. I’ve used it a number of times. However, there are so many people, even UWM students and especially those with low income, that rely on Planned Parenthood for their health needs. For the majority of their patients, Planned Parenthood is their only health care provider.
No Planned Parenthood employee or patient is out in the world preaching how much they love abortion. It’s not in a positive light for anyone. It’s traumatic. What is positive is that there is a safe place to have one if the need is there so an unplanned child is not born into a toxic environment.
Walker also has made it so women who want to have an abortion have to get a medically unnecessary ultrasound which only purpose I see is to shame them. Planned Parenthood is an affordable, no-judgment facility that so many people rely on and believe in. Cutting funds to an organization that does so much good and only provides less than 3 percent of “controversial” services is an unnecessary use of Walker’s time that could be put to bettering our state instead of hurting it.