Planned Parenthood Kahului Health Center, one of two Planned Parenthood locations in the state, would also lose funding if the rule change is approved. In addition to providing contraception and other family planning, Title X funding supports a number of services at the health center, including wellness exams, lifesaving cervical and breast cancer screenings, birth control, contraception education, and STD testing and treatment.
“This policy is a direct attack on low-income women and the most vulnerable,” Katie Rogers, Communications Manager for Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest and the Hawaiian Islands told me. “These are the very people who the Title X program is supposed to serve. This will disproportionately hurt women who identify as members of racial or ethnic communities that often face significant health challenges due to systemic inequities. Out of the 4 million family planning patients served by Title X, more than half are women of color: 21 percent of all Title X clients identify as Black or African American, and 32 percent identify as Hispanic or Latino.”
In 2017, Rogers added, PPGNHI provided “Title X health care services to nearly 4,000 people in both Honolulu and Maui. Of those served in Maui, more than 40 percent of the patients are people of color.”
Basically, the Trump Administration wants to strip essential family planning and health services from low-income populations in a way that disproportionately hurts women from minority populations, all because the centers offer abortions (which are legal).
Don’t let Trump move on us “like a bitch.” You can submit a public comment on the proposed rule change until July 31 by visiting FederalRegister.gov and searching for Docket HHS-OS-2018-0008.
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