I feel that it is an important time to make awareness as to why planned parenthood is such an important aspect in women's health. This is not a political statement but a statement emphasizing that eliminating planned parenthood and making abortions illegal will be detrimental to women's healthcare.

1. Planned parenthood protects the future of young females.

Planned parenthood not only gives women the healthcare they desperately need but also provides a safe place for women to get the contraception they cannot afford and the healthcare some may not be able to afford. Allowing women the right to choose when they want to bear a child is not only a basic human right but a way to ensure the life of these babies is a healthy one. Women who are not ready to have a child financially or mentally should not be forced to go on and carry that child until they can ensure a good life for the baby. By providing access to contraception these issues can be avoided and unplanned pregnancies are far less likely to occur.

2. Contraception and the right to choose when a woman wants to have a baby is a basic female right.

It's rather simple, when a woman wants to have a baby she can have a baby. It is absolutely absurd that the male leaders of this country feel that they can have a say to this matter. If it was them who would be the ones pregnant it is almost certain there would be a different opinion on this. The right to your own body is a right that should never be questioned in women's healthcare. By providing contraception to young males and females, we are providing a choice.

3. Banning contraception and abortions will not stop people from having sex or getting an unsafe abortion.

Rates of abortions have dramatically decreased since the 1950's post Roe v. Wade because of the advances in birth control and the legalization of abortions as an aspect of basic human rights. Knowing this it is also important to note that abortion rates have actually just hit the lowest in history since 1973's Roe v. Wade. Banning abortion and decreasing funding to planned parenthood will not only increase the rates of abortions attained illegally but also the death rates of women who seek an abortion not performed by a healthcare professional. Does this sound like proper women's health care to you?

4. If women should be punished by jail time for seeking an abortion so should the man that got them pregnant.

As many pro-life activists suggest, women who receive abortions should be punished by time in prison. This is a senseless way of saying that because a woman is impregnated by a male, the burden to carry that child is entirely hers regardless of the circumstance. In my opinion if this is the case then the men who do not at that time want any responsibility over the future life of that child should also be held accountable for this so called"crime."

5. Pro-choice does not mean anti-life

As many pro-life readers are probably thinking, I am some baby hating, murder accepting feminist that has no heart. This is not at all the case. As many pro-choice believers also share a love for children and see the major importance in ensuring that these babies live a wonderful healthy life with parents entirely prepared for providing them with this. We also believe that the choice to have a child and to be sexually active is entirely the woman's choice to make. Therefore by providing contraception to females the issue of abortion can be entirely avoided. Decreasing funding to planned parenthood and banning abortions will not stop people from seeking out these things, it will inherently just make it much more dangerous for women to receive the health care they deserve. A right entitled to them by the constitution and the Supreme Court Case of Roe v. Wade in 1973. All lives matter, men, women, and children so lets not put that at risk by taking away the simple principles that make up women's healthcare.