Changes Could Leave Many Women Without Access To Healthcare
DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM) - Poor and uninsured North Texas women are speaking out about a state rule change that will be sure to set up a show down with federal officials over healthcare funding. Unless a compromise is found, funding for the Women's Health Program will likely end next month.
"When you think that here in North Texas, we are talking about 6,800 women... where are 6,800 women going to find care?", says Kelly Hart, spokesperson for Planned Parenthood of North Texas.
The Women's Health Program is a special Medicaid program that provides basic women's health care-- breast cancer screenings, pap smears and contraceptives-- for low income and uninsured women.
According to the Center for Public Policy Priorities, a non-partisan, nonprofit policy institute based in Austin, the program saved taxpayers more than $120 million dollars over two years by reducing Medicaid costs from unplanned births. According to a statement from the agency, "Under current law, the program does not pay for abortions or fund any providers who offer abortions.
But, the state's new rule excludes health-care providers from participating in the program if they have any kind of common ownership or management, or share a name or brand, with another provider that offers abortions, even if the two are legally separate entities. State leaders readily admit that the new rule is designed solely to deny funding to Planned Parenthood."
"I've been using Planned Parenthood services for on and off for about 10 years now," says Alexis Lohse, a married mother of two and full time student. "And none of it has ever had anything to do with abortion. It's had everything to do with preventing abortion and staying healthy for when I could become a mother."
Lohse spoke to reporters at Planned Parenthood's Dallas headquarters today... likening our state's leaders to defiant 3-year-olds, as the increasingly caustic debate over abortion threatens to deny uninsured women access to critical care.
She was joined by Chenoa Elizabeth, a current Women's Health Plan patient who told us that prior to learning about the program, hadn't had a well woman exam in three years. "Everyone has a right to be healthy," says Elizabeth.
A spokesperson for Governor Rick Perry's office told CBS 11 that they are fighting to obtain a waiver that would allow the program to continue, but "Texas shouldn't be held hostage because the federal government wants us to implement a program in the way that they want us to... this is about state's rights."
Meanwhile, "I worry that there will be more unintended pregnancies," says Hart. "I worry that they'll show up in Parkland's emergency room with full stage cervical cancer when they could have come to us and had precancerous cervical cells treated before it ever got to that stage."
Dallas' county hospital also stands to lose funding if the program is discontinued. "Parkland stands to lose $1,016,170 in funding for more than 4300 low-income family planning patients," says Paula Turicchi, Senior Vice President of Women & Infants Specialty Health at Parkland Hospital. "Because eliminating access to services may result in unintended pregnancies, Parkland plans to continue family planning services by requiring co-payment for services at community clinics throughout Dallas County."
While the abortion debate has become increasingly caustic and partisan, Elizabeth says politics should take a back seat to women's health. "We can point fingers all day... but, women aren't going to be able to go to the doctor, and that's what's important."
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