What is Planned Parenthood’s primary mission?

We fight for everyone’s access to reproductive health care Its overwhelming dependence on public funding makes it political

deserve, that’s exactly what you do.

However, providing health care means nothing if people cannot access it. Politicizing health care has real-life consequences. Ohio’s most vulnerable people face obstacles accessing basic reproductive health care because politicians want to defund Planned Parenthood.

Politics, not a concern for public health, drove Ohio legislators to bar Planned Parenthood from funding to provide health services, including life-saving cancer screenings for uninsured women of color and pregnancyprevention education for foster care teens.

Politics, not a concern for public health, drove Ohio legislators to deny public school teachers and parents, who gave their consent, access to medically accurate, age-appropriate sexual-health education provided by Planned Parenthood. This exclusion leaves students to learn from programs that preach abstinence-only until marriage and press young people to make virginity pledges.

Politics drove Ohio legislators to exclude culturally competent Planned Parenthood community health care specialists from two counties having especially high black infant mortality rates: Mahoning and Trumbull. Planned Parenthood community health care specialists visit high-risk pregnant mothers between visits to their doctors and infants through the first year of life.

Politics, not concern for public health, drove the Trump-pence administration to dictate radical changes to Title X that will dangerously undermine Planned Parenthood health centers’ ability to offer patients medically accurate, comprehensive care. Title X is the only federal program exclusively dedicated to providing lowincome patients with access to family planning and plays a vital role in ensuring safe, timely and evidencebased care is available to every individual. In Ohio, excluding Planned Parenthood from this program will put more than 63% of Title X patients at risk of losing access to critical primary and preventive services.

Medical professionals protest isolating Planned Parenthood. The American College of Gynecologists has said loud and clear:“politicians should not be able to pick and choose among qualified providers, dictate the counseling physicians can give their patients, or undermine women’s access to evidencebased, necessary preventive services.”

I join the countless patients, medical providers and supporters who envision a world in which health care and politics are separate. Unfortunately, that is not our reality. The fight for reproductive rights and bodily autonomy is larger than any one individual or organization — it’s a movement. While some try to create distraction and mischaracterize our shared mission, Planned Parenthood will continue to cut through the noise and offer all people — regardless of their race, gender identity, sexual orientation, immigration status or how much money they have — the high-quality access to the health care and education they need to live full, prosperous lives. that be within the abortion business.

The day after the article ran, Wen tweeted a carefully crafted clarification of her vision.

“I am always happy to do interviews but these headlines completely misconstrue my vision for Planned Parenthood,” she wrote. “First, our core mission is providing, protecting and expanding access to abortion and reproductive health care,” she continued in another tweet. “We will never back down from that fight — it’s a fundamental human right and women’s lives are at stake.”

After Wen’s termination in July, it can only be assumed that those tweets came after a slap on the wrist from the board of directors.

In a statement explaining her “secret” firing, Wen outlined what she called “philosophical differences” between her and the board: “I believe the best way to protect abortion care is to be clear that it is not a political issue but a health care one, and that we can expand support for reproductive rights by finding common ground with the large majority of Americans who understand reproductive health care as the fundamental health care that it is.”

Wen’s vision lost out, and it’s no wonder why.

With more than a half-billion taxpayer dollars being funneled to Planned Parenthood each year, the operation is certainly a political one.

Consider the fact that in 2017-2018, Planned Parenthood performed 332,757 abortions — accounting for approximately 96% of the group’s pregnancy-related services.

That same year, it received $563.8 million in taxpayer funding. As divided as the country is over the subject of abortion, the siphoning of that much money is a powerful feat that takes major political influence to achieve.

That’s why Planned Parenthood’s PAC sweats so hard to spill millions of dollars at the feet of pro-abortion candidates every election cycle.

And yet, despite their best efforts, the current political situation is undeniably shaky for Planned Parenthood. With states like Ohio passing pro-life legislation like the “heartbeat bill,” as well as a recalibrated Supreme Court with a pro-life majority, the country could very well see the reversal of Roe v. Wade in the near future.

Not only that, but the day before Wen was fired, a new rule from the Trump administration took effect, slashing

$60 million in Title X funding from Planned Parenthood’s coffers.

Rather than comply with the new rule and stop abortions and abortion referrals, Planned Parenthood decided to protect abortion at all costs, saying its clinics will start using their own emergency funds while it wages a legal fight.

By firing Wen, they’ve shown their hand in a major way. Abortion isn’t just one of many “health care” services the business provides.

It’s core to their mission.

Wen said so. And with her termination, so did the board.