As if you needed another example to convince you that Planned Parenthood is in the business of making money and not “women’s healthcare,” some telling statistics underscore that sad reality. The Radiance foundation released a powerful graphic showing the steady decline of Planned Parenthood’s “health services.” All legitimate health care at Planned Parenthood (breast cancer screenings, PAP tests, HPV treatments, etc.) steadily declined through fiscal years 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, and 2014. Mammograms did not decline, because, in case you forgot, Planned Parenthood does not and never did perform mammograms despite what their political lackeys will tell you.
Meanwhile, as America’s largest abortion business, Planned Parenthood continued to kill more than 300,000 babies every year in abortions. In the five years that saw a precipitous decline in actual health care, Planned Parenthood ended the lives of more than 1.5 million babies. Planned Parenthood’s annual reports confirm these horrifying statistics.
In those same years, prenatal care provided by Planned Parenthood declined 44%. There’s a reason that for every pregnant mother who receives an adoption referral at Planned Parenthood, 149 women abort their babies. Adoption doesn’t benefit Planned Parenthood’s bottom line, and abortion does.
If anyone is still not convinced that this is ultimately about money, Ryan Bomberger reminds us that Planned Parenthood’s president, Cecile Richards, received a pay raise, a big one. From 2011 to 2014, Richards’ salary more than doubled. Last year, she took home nearly $1M. Bomberger underscores that almost no one else doubles her salary in a few short years. Perhaps Richards’ lucrative compensation is a reward for Planned Parenthood affiliates exceeding abortion quotas, profiting from the illegal sale of baby body parts, and reducing unprofitable prenatal care by 44%.
While celebrating Planned Parenthood’s grisly 100th birthday and fear-mongering about the election results, Planned Parenthood demands the continuation of federal funding. This is understandable. Who wouldn’t want to keep receiving half a billion dollars in taxpayer funding? But Americans should be asking more urgently than ever: Why are we funding Planned Parenthood?
For too long, Pro-Life Americans have allowed the anti-Life lobby to pretend that women’s health care must include abortion. Abortion is not health care. The reason Planned Parenthood executives insist on the “need” for abortion is their own financial interest. Bomberger makes the case succinctly:
In 2014, the “nonprofit” reported $309.2 million in Health Services income…Planned Parenthood reports that the cost of killing a baby in the first trimester can be up to $1500. More specific costs can be found here: from $415 to $1110, from 4 weeks to 18 weeks gestation. (Note: PPFA doesn’t report the age of the human beings they abort, so as with many unreported details, we have to estimate). The average cost, assuming all PPFA abortions were first trimester (which they’re not) would be $762.50. So this cost times 323,999 abortions equals $247,049,237.50. That’s 80% of their health services revenue.
Federally qualified health centers that provide women and their families with real health care vastly outnumber Planned Parenthood affiliates. Planned Parenthood’s finely tuned business model of death rakes in money through the killing of the preborn. Sending women to Planned Profithood for basic health services is an injustice. The decline of all health services while abortion numbers remain high is further proof of this sad reality.