I am a recent member of Susan G. Komen for the Cure’s Young Women’s National Advisory Council, a previous director of Stony Brook University School of Medicine’s chapter of Medical Students for Choice, and a future family medicine physician. I was incredibly disappointed by Susan G. Komen’s recent decision to end its funding of breast health programs at Planned Parenthood affiliates across the United States.
The Komen Foundation’s statement says that it “will continue to fund existing grants, including those of Planned Parenthood, and preserve their eligibility to apply for future grants, while maintaining the ability of our affiliates to make funding decisions that meet the needs of their communities.” But this is NOT a reversal of any kind.
We must stand with Planned Parenthood. But let’s not do so in a way that denies the extreme importance of all the services they provide. As advocates for reproductive justice, the last thing we can afford to do is allow ourselves to become complicit in the stigmatization of abortion.
I've written more than twenty books, but was startled by what I learned: you can raise the possibility of abortion, but it must be rejected. I hit a wall of resistance I believe is self-censorship on the part of the publishers. When a character is pregnant, whether from rape, incest, etc., so long as a baby is born, that's acceptable. The "Juno" scenario.
Anti-choicers claim to be looking out for women and for children, but their policy choices do nothing but to hurt women and children. A new study even shows how anti-choicers preferred policy would result in a much higher maternal mortality rate.
In the years ahead, Advocates will continue to be a dynamic leader in promoting the rights of youth to information, education, and services. I am deeply committed to our current, innovative work expanding adolescent access to contraception domestically and internationally; fighting homophobia in schools and communities across the United States; and using our policy work on the Hill and with the administration to advance the goals of our state and local partners.
