A tired, emotionally drained seventeen year old sits in her idling car and aimlessly stares out her window. Her eyes gradually fix on the silver lettering that contrasts against the wooden background of the Minneapolis Planned Parenthood facility. It seems like the right choice, certainly the easiest choice, to walk through those doors and quickly leave her pregnancy behind her forever. However, this young woman will soon realize she does not need Planned Parenthood. Instead, she needs and deserves healthcare that gives her hope.
In today’s culture, women and girls are constantly told that they need Planned Parenthood and the services which it offers--especially abortion. After all, the media is persistently stating that without Planned Parenthood, women’s healthcare would be nonexistent. However, the facts are simple: the media spreads fabricated half-truths and women don’t need Planned Parenthood.
Planned Parenthood, the largest provider of abortions in Minnesota, has a history of being unsafe for women. Women don’t need Planned Parenthood--they certainly don’t need healthcare that has a history of both lying to them and placing them in harmful circumstances.
THE LIE: Planned Parenthood cares about women.
Planned Parenthood constantly says that it cares about women, that it wants women to be safe, happy, and fulfilled. PP tells the world that they’re always there to help women. However, their actions disprove their words.
THE TRUTH: Planned Parenthood doesn’t care about trafficked women and girls.
In 2011, Live Action conducted an undercover investigation into Planned Parenthood. Eight individual PP employees were caught on camera, blatantly stating their willingness to aid and cover up for the sex trafficking industry. Those posing to be pimps and prostitutes told the PP workers that many of their trafficked girls were fourteen or fifteen, but the PP employees were unphased. Instead of being shocked and reporting sex trafficking of women and girls, these Planned Parenthood employees happily gave whom they believed to be pimps financial aid and other resources for abortions for trafficked women. Planned Parenthood doesn’t care about abused, hurting, trafficked women. In fact, they’re willing to cover it up to sell more of their core product: abortions.
THE LIE: Abortion is only 3% of what PP does.
Planned Parenthood has claimed that their main objective is broad women’s healthcare, not abortion. When asked about how much of their services are abortion-related, they claim that they offer much more to women’s healthcare.
THE TRUTH: PP is part of the abortion industry, and abortion makes up far more than 3% of its services.
Planned Parenthood arrives at the statistic of “3%” by dividing the number of abortion procedures for the year (332,757) by the number of “services” it provides (9.7 million). Not only this, but Planned Parenthood’s annual report defines a “service” as a “discrete clinical interaction,” such as a giving out of a pregnancy test. Let’s think about the implications of using statistics this way.
If a woman goes to PP for an abortion, and, while she’s there, is also given an STI test, pregnancy test, a contraceptive, and a pamphlet on abortion information, the actual abortion procedure would be only 20% of the “services” she received. But in fact, abortion is actually about 97% of what PP does. This video explains how PP arrives at “3%” very well.
ADF Legal has also uncovered that PP has monthly “abortion quotas” which they push each of their facilities to surpass. It has been reported that PP employees are rewarded with pizza parties and personal time off for reaching these quotas. Why the quotas? Abortion is the most expensive service which PP offers, so to keep the money flowing they must perform enough of them and provide incentive for each center to do so. Because of these quotas, PP employees consistently push abortion on women, because Planned Parenthood the leader of the abortion industry.
THE LIE: Abortion is safe.
Planned Parenthood routinely claims that “[Abortion] is one of the safest medical procedures you can get.”
THE TRUTH: Abortion is not safe.
A procedure that ends the life of a human being cannot be and will never be “safe.” Murder is not “safe.” Abortion is not “safe.” But while abortion is clearly unsafe for the living being whose life is ended, it is also unsafe for the mother.
Studies have shown that American women who have undergone abortions are 2.6 times more likely to commit suicide, and have a 6% lower fertility rate after having an abortion. Women who undergo first trimester abortions have also been statistically shown to be 86% more likely to have a preterm birth, and women who have had second trimester abortions are 267% more likely to do so. After an abortion, women’s medical admissions incerase by four times and their surgical admissions increase by five. Abortion hurts children, but it also hurts women. Abortion is not safe.
THE LIE: PP offers mammograms.
Planned Parenthood is consistently asserting that they offer extensive mammogram services— x-rays that help to determine if women have breast cancer.
THE TRUTH: PP does not offer mammograms.
Former president of PP, Cecile Richards, has stated: “We do not have mammogram machines at our health centers.” Then why spread misinformation to women that you actually do provide this service? If Planned Parenthood lies about mammograms, what else are they lying about?
THE LIE: PP offers and supports prenatal care.
Planned Parenthood persistently spreads the lie that they offer prenatal care. Former PP president, Cecile Richards, has stated that women need healthcare that will fight for their prenatal care.
THE TRUTH: It has been reported that PP only does abortions.
Contrary to the lies they spread, Planned Parenthood is the leading abortion provider. PP is not concerned with helping women throughout their pregnancies—only with getting rid of unwanted pregnancies. Planned Parenthood does not offer prenatal care.
Planned Parenthood is not pro-woman.
Planned Parenthood lies about offering mammograms and prenatal services. PP does less than 2% of national breast exams, less than 1% of pap tests, and less than 2% of cancer screenings. However, PP does 34.9% of our nation’s abortions. PP also does 149 abortions for every one adoption “referral.” However, in 2017, Federally Qualified Health Centers performed 1,853,912 cervical cancer screenings, 724,187 mammograms, and increased their contraceptive services by 13%. To top it off, FQHCs don’t lie to women about the services which they provide. FQHCs don’t push women to have unsafe procedures, and do not stand behind profit-driven incentives. FQHCs, along with other nationwide pregnancy resource centers and family planning centers are healthcare providers that care about women.
THE MYTH: “Without PP, women would have nowhere to turn, especially for contraceptive care.”
Oftentimes, the media makes the claim that if Planned Parenthood (PP) was defunded, women would have no healthcare, and specifically no contraceptive services. However, that myth is misleading.
THE TRUTH: If PP was defunded, Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs) could very likely both accommodate and counsel women who seek contraceptive care.
In fact, FQHCs currently greatly outnumber PP facilities on a national level and offer higher quality services. A study done by Guttmacher Institute (Planned Parenthood’s former research affiliate), revealed that FQHCs outnumbered PP cites in counties that provided contraception care in all but three states. Moreover, according to this report, Planned Parenthood centers were nationally located in only 415 US counties while towering 1,719 counties had a FQHC site.
Not only do FQHCs nationally outnumber PP centers by thousands, but they statistically offer a larger variety of services for women at a far better quality. Women ought to have quality healthcare, and should not be given healthcare which has a history of being unsafe.
Women deserve healthcare that gives them hope.
So what kind of healthcare do women need? And what does it look like? Real healthcare looks like clinics which speak grace and truth amidst a world of lies. Women deserve the truth—they deserve to see their ultrasounds and to be given all of the facts about their pregnancy and the precious life inside them. Their choices ought to be laid out before them, not hidden under a profit-driven industry. Quality healthcare looks like a team of trained medical professionals that will stand up for the most vulnerable in this world—both pregnant mothers and preborn children.
Thankfully, because of President Trump’s recent Protect Life Rule, Planned Parenthood will be stripped of $60 million in taxpayer funding. Where will this money go? $60 million will now be going to healthcare centers that truly care about women.
Planned Parenthood lies to women. That’s not very pro-woman.
For all the hype surrounding PP and the “quality healthcare” it provides, it would make sense for them to have the best interest of both women and children at heart. However, Planned Parenthood consistently lies about which services which they provide, asserts that abortion is “only 3% of what they do,” and claims that they offer mammograms and prenatal care. Planned Parenthood doesn’t do any of these things. They need to stop lying to women. Women deserve better than this.
Women don’t need Planned Parenthood.
Women don’t need unsafe healthcare. They don’t need lies. Women don’t need “healthcare” corporations that aid sex trafficking. They don’t need profit-driven abortion agendas. Women shouldn’t have to have low quality healthcare— because they deserve more services and to be told the truth about those services. Women need centers that give them the truth through compassionate, quality healthcare.
As a healthcare center, the most pro-woman thing to do is to stand with her and give her love, support, and truth throughout her entire pregnancy. What is the least pro-woman thing healthcare providers can do? Good question. The most anti-woman thing to do is tot tell a women that they will only stand by her if she doesn’t continue with her pregnancy. Planned Parenthood is not pro-woman. Planned Parenthood does not offer hope and services to pregnant mothers who wish to see their children take their first breath. PP is never the right solution, and there are other options for women.
A young pregnant woman seeking help and guidance is far better served by going to a Federally Qualified Health Center or a local crisis pregnancy center. She doesn’t need to undergo an unsafe abortion that could harm her. She doesn’t need to go to a healthcare provider which lies about which services it offers. She doesn’t need to go to a healthcare center that covers up sex trafficking. She doesn’t need Planned Parenthood because she has other, better options.
By going to a healthcare center that actually cares about her, a pregnant woman has access to adoption services, supplies such as diapers or blankets, and compassionate support. Ultimately, pregnant women ought to be given healthcare which gives them hope and truth.
After all, women are strong enough to be told the truth about their healthcare, about their body, and about their baby. But Planned Parenthood doesn’t and won’t ever give women the truth. So women don’t need Planned Parenthood. Women are better served by going elsewhere. Women need healthcare centers that will give them quality healthcare in hope, compassion, and truth.
