The following editorial was submitted in response to an editorial printed in the Detroit Free Press by Lori Lamerand President/CEO of Planned Parenthood Mid and South Michigan:
Faulty Family Planning Assumptions
Lori Lamerand's commentary on government family planning programs (How not to prevent unwanted pregnancies, from June 16) is so full of factual distortions and faulty assumptions, one barely knows where to begin responding.
Lamerand misleadingly says that the “current Michigan budget zeros out all family planning dollars.” (her emphasis). Absolutely untrue. While $1.7 million in state taxpayer dollars are being eliminated, she conveniently fails to mention the $9.6 million in federal dollars being spent on family planning programs which the state appropriates, plus millions more in Medicaid dollars.
She falsely equates efforts in Washington and some states to divert $365 million in funding from Planned Parenthood to other health care providers as “a vicious attack on women's reproductive health care.” Despite her protestations, Planned Parenthood is not the end all and be all of family planning. Taking taxpayer money from America's #1 abortion provider and giving it to another health agency will not change the services, just who provides them.
She laments that “a whopping 53% of [Michigan] pregnancies” are unplanned – a number which has been stable for decades. That means half of us reading this were probably “unplanned.” I believe the half of us in that category contribute a great deal of good to our society. With Michigan being the only state to lose population in the last decade, each child conceived in our state should be considered a valuable asset. Our state should want, and does need, every child to be born.
Likewise, she is concerned that these “unwanted” children are costing taxpayers money, as if their safe birth and well-being are not worth the investment. Her self-serving logic is that giving $365 million taxpayer dollars to Planned Parenthood is a good expenditure, but caring for “unplanned” people is a “burden on American taxpayers.”
Planned Parenthood portrays abortion as only 2% of their “services” provided, but again, fails to mention that 10% of their clients receive abortions and over 30% of their revenues come from abortions. They are the ultimate abortion 'big box store' chain. It is a #1 ranking they should not be proud of.
The controversy around Planned Parenthood's government funding would likely evaporate if they would just eliminate an insignificant “2%” of their services - the over 332,000 abortions they perform in a year. Or are those hundreds of millions of dollars in abortion revenues too important to their bottom line?
