During the fight in Congress over Planned Parenthood, we repeatedly were told defunding the nation’s largest abortion provider would harm women’s health. Case in point, the Senate vote was dishonestly called an attack that would “take away cancer screenings and birth control from American women.” While Planned Parenthood and its supporters are desperately trying to bury the truth under a mountain of false statements, a closer examination of what’s really happening on a local level exposes a number of facts about the abortion industry.
Glenwood Springs in Garfield County, Colorado, has one Planned Parenthood and one federally qualified health center. Mountain Family Health Center, the federally qualified health center, provides more services than Planned Parenthood. There is, though, an exception. Abortion. Why is that important? A few reasons.
Along with the more than $300 million Planned Parenthood receives in federal funding, some Planned Parenthood clinics, including the Glenwood Springs clinic, receive funding from the United Way. As mentioned already, Glenwood Springs has its own federally qualified health center. So the argument that Planned Parenthood is the only health care provider available to women is false. The only reason for the United Way to fund Planned Parenthood in Glenwood Springs is to fund abortion.
Yet the United Way of Garfield County website doesn’t even mention abortion. Planned Parenthood is described in a single, deceptive sentence. Planned Parenthood: “Provides affordable, confidential reproductive health care that includes education, screening for breast and cervical cancer, testing and treatment for sexually transmitted diseases and contraceptives.” That’s it.
A little background information here is helpful. Every local United Way is separately incorporated, with its own board of directors that make the funding decisions. Some decide in favor of funding abortion providers. Some decide against. By funding Planned Parenthood, the United Way of Garfield County is strengthening the abortion industry.
Glenwood Springs provides a good example of how the public is being misled on this matter. In the all-out attempt to save federal funding for Planned Parenthood, women’s health isn’t the issue, abortion is the issue. The 8,000 federally qualified health center delivery sites compared to only 800 Planned Parenthood clinics illustrate this fact on a national level. And regarding abortion, even if federal funding for Planned Parenthood is cut, private funding is still there supporting abortion providers. Unfortunately, the United Way isn’t alone.
