Today in Anti-Woman Douchecanoery

First up is New Hampshire. Oh, New Hampshire. The NH Council voted last week to not renew a contract with Planned Parenthood there. PP there has operated under a limited pharmacy lisence based on that particular contract. Without the contract, the clinics are now no longer dispensing contraception. The reasoning for the denial of the contract? The same, tired bullshit about not wanting taxpayers to fund an organization that provides a medical service some people don't like.

The Planned Parenthood contract, which accounts for about 20 percent of its annual New Hampshire budget, would have paid for education, distributing contraception, and the testing and treatment of sexually transmitted infections. The organization's abortion practice is paid for by private donations, Trombley [Steve, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Northern New England] said, with audits ensuring no public money is used.

Last year, Planned Parenthood provided contraception for 13,242 patients in New Hampshire, Trombley said. The organization also provided 6,112 breast exams, 5,548 screenings for cervical cancer and 18,858 tests for sexually transmitted infections. If the contract is not renewed, Planned Parenthood will drastically reduce its services, Trombley said. The organization employs 80 people in New Hampshire.

Planned Parenthood treats 52 percent of patients whose care is subsidized by the New Hampshire state family planning program, Trombley said. It provides its services on a sliding scale based on income, with 70 percent of patients paying nothing or near nothing for birth control pills because they earn less than 150 percent of the federal poverty line.

The centers are turning away 20 - 30 people per day--people who cannot afford to pay full cost for contraception. Some, in part, due to lack of insurance. Don't, however, look to the council to necessarily care:

Another executive councilor who opposed the contract, Raymond Wieczorek of Manchester, said he had asked if the contract could exclude the issuance of condoms. Wieczorek said he supports paying to test for sexually transmitted diseases but does not believe the state should subsidize contraception.

"If they want to have a good time, why not let them pay for it?" he said.

Really, that just says it all right there, don't you think?

Next up: More Wisconsin.

In Wisconsin, an anti-abortion group is demanding the attorney general start enforcing a provision added onto Scott Walker's budget clusterfuck that is directed at university med students and their ability to learn adequate and comprehensive patient care procedures.

State law has long prohibited the use of public funds to pay physicians to perform most abortions. As amended by the Republican-controlled Legislature last month, that state law now specifies that UW Hospital and Clinics is in fact a state “agency” and subject to this law.

UW Health asked Gov. Scott Walker to veto the provision, charging that the claim UWHC uses state funds is “incorrect” and will set a dangerous precedent with “disastrous consequences” that will ripple far beyond the controversial issue of abortion training. UW claims that without the training, which involves two rotations for one month outside the university premises at Planned Parenthood clinics, its gynecology and obstetrics training program could lose its accreditation and women in Wisconsin could lose access to many health services across the state, not just abortions.

[...]

Dr. Fredrik Broekhuizen, the medical director for Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin who also has an academic practice at the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee, says it is vital for medical students to be trained in abortion services.

“There are medically indicated pregnancy terminations, and physicians need to have skills to do that,” says Broekhuizen. He notes that even physicians who do not work in abortion clinics may well need to perform an abortion.

“There are situations where patients have fetal death in utero at 16 to 18 weeks of gestation,” he says. “The mode of delivery in the case of a dead fetus is exactly the same procedure as an abortion procedure. So learning these techniques is an essential part of what an ob/gyn needs to know in order to provide comprehensive care to women, regardless of where they choose to practice.”

And this is why, he says, the accreditation organization for ob/gyn programs requires that training in abortion services be offered. “Residents can opt out if they have moral objections, but that should be part of the training.” And without elective abortion procedures offered at UW or any other Madison hospital, the only option for such training is Planned Parenthood, he adds.

In opposing the Republican budget measure, UW Hospital officials also argued that UW does not pay for the training because Meriter Hospital funds that portion of resident training.

The "Right to Life" group opposes this reasoning saying that it's just "legalistic manipulations". The group blathers on about how "residents need to be instructed how to save, preserve and respect life, not how to kill preborn children..." but they obviously don't give a shit about saving, preserving, or respecting the lives of women who need the medical procedures a resident learns how to do in training. Just for one example: after 10 weeks gestation, a miscarriage is more likely to be incomplete and a woman may need a D&C. Does this so called "pro-life" group care? No. They don't. They don't give a shit about women except as incubators for those "preborn children" (once born, though, those same people scream "BOOTSTRAPS!").

There are not words to describe my contempt for these anti-life crusaders. They like to point at pro-choice people and call them "pro-death" but pro-choicers aren't the ones condemning women to not have access to medical care or comprehensively trained physicians.