Imagine: You’re a 26-year-old female who just got laid off. You’re taking a shower one day when you discover an enlargement in your left breast, you think it’s something worth going to the doctor for. You then remember you just got laid off from your job and lost your health insurance. You check your savings and you don’t have enough to go see a private doctor, considering you just lost your job. You put it off not being able to afford the to trip to the doctor for a mammogram.

Three months later you have a steady job with good health insurance, you had forgotten about the lump you discovered until it started to become painful. You go to the doctor where they tell you that you have developed stage 3 breast cancer. They tell you if they had caught it sooner they could have stopped it easier before it progressed to this advanced stage.

Why is Planned Parenthood such an important topic?

There are millions of low-income families in the United States who do not have access to private healthcare; these men and women rely on centers such as planned parenthood to get the quality healthcare they need at a price that they can afford. Not only do they provide affordable healthcare, they give free birth control, cancer screenings, and maternity care to men and women under Obamacare (2016).

As of 2017 the American Health Care Act, or Trumpcare, plans to retract funding from planned parenthood, meaning Americans who depend on Medicaid as their insurance will no longer have access to the free benefits provided by Planned Parenthood.

This, unfortunately means that Planned Parenthood would lose most of their clients, since most the people taking advantage of Planned Parenthood are low-income families who are insured under Medicaid, causing Planned Parenthood to lose money that keeps them running and providing for other patients. These facilities would shut down due to loss of vital funding and deny sex healthcare to millions of low-income men and women.

Why is Planned Parenthood so controversial?

Since Planned Parenthood is a sexual health facility some of the locations provide women the option to terminate their pregnancy. Abortion is obviously a hot topic in our congress, and Trump wants to reverse Roe vs Wade, the U.S. Supreme Court Case in 1973 which gave women the right to opt for an abortion.

Reversing this law would be a clear violation of the constitution and the privacy of women, and their right to choose. There is huge debate between pro-life and pro-choice sides about whether it is ethical for the government to provide support to a facility that gives abortions. Many people don’t know that the government does not provide funding for abortions at these clinics.

Only 3 Percent of  the services provided at Planned Parenthood are abortions, and most Planned Parenthood clinics throughout the United States do not even offer abortions. In 1976 the Hyde Amendment was passed, blocking Medicaid funding for abortions, this means the government legally cannot provide funding for abortions, even though they provide funding for other non-controversial health services.

There is a large misconception between prolife supporters that Planned Parenthood only provides abortions, which is not true. The educate the community in sexual health, while providing reproductive health services, general health services, screenings and counseling for women and men.

They also help men and women to identify and treat sexually transmitted infections. Another large service they provide is helping pregnant women in finding doctors to help them carry their babies to term and helping women who want to put their babies up for adoption find the services they need to do so. If an abortion does occur in the clinic they offer counseling for afterwards if the women requests it, although abortions only account for 3% of the services provided!

There is also a large myth that Planned Parenthood Profits off the fetal tissue extracted in the abortion process. This comes from a video where pro-life activists were pretending to be medical professionals in a Planned Parenthood facilities and discussed the use of fetal tissue in scientific research instead of proper disposal. This is simply a fake video that places Planned Parenthood in a negative spotlight while influencing people to believe false information.

Planned Parenthood from my perspective.

Planned Parenthood plays an important role in providing sexual health services to men, women, and teens throughout the United States. They provide a safe environment to educate patients on sexual health while providing them services to improve this as well. It is unfair to base your opinion on Planned Parenthood per their use of abortion to women who chose this.

Under the constitution and the privacy, it guarantees it would be unconstitutional to take the right of an abortion away from women, and it is just as bad to remove the facility that provides safe, legal abortions.

The controversy surrounding Planned Parenthood stems from uneducated people making assumptions based on wrong facts. Many Americans do not want their tax dollars going towards a service, such as abortion, that they do not support, and since many people are unaware that their money isn’t going towards that, they view Planned Parenthood negatively.

I honestly believe it is a personal choice to decide whether to have an abortion or not, and the constitution supports this. People are entitled to their beliefs and they should live their lives per them, but I don’t believe personal beliefs justify taking someone else’s rights away. Planned Parenthood provides too many valuable services to lose funding, especially when the basis for defunding is based on the misconceptions and controversies surrounding it.