Is Planned Parenthood really the “plan?”

This week marks the 100th anniversary of the creation of Planned Parenthood Federation of America. There is much controversy surrounding the federation. At the center of the Planned Parenthood debate is the issue of abortion.
Planned Parenthood is lauded as the beacon of choice for women. Funny thing about choice is that it requires options. Does Planned Parenthood actually provide authentic choices for women?
Planned Parenthood clearly favors providing abortion services as an alternative to adoption and prenatal care services. Even though eight out of 10 American women desire to bring their pregnancy to term, only 7.8 percent of Planned Parenthood’s clinics provide prenatal care, and even lower still are those clinics that provide adoption services. Meanwhile over half of Planned Parenthood’s clinics provide abortion services.
Back in 2009, at their annual conference, Planned Parenthood administrators announced that they were beginning to phase out prenatal care because, “the prenatal patients were too cumbersome.” Since then, Planned Parenthood has cut their prenatal care services in half, and by 2015, Planned Parenthood lost over 20,000 pregnant patients.
As of 2014, over 94 percent of all pregnant women seeking services from Planned Parenthood ended up receiving an induced abortion. Planned Parenthood’s numbers are well above the national trend which currently stands at 21 percent of pregnant women seeking abortion.
Why is Planned Parenthood so obsessed with promoting abortion rather than the care that the majority of women desire? Put simply, abortion makes money – caring for pregnant women does not.
Planned Parenthood loves to try to ease Americans’ conscience by claiming that only 3 percent of their services include abortion. While this may be true, it only represents part of the story. The other part is that abortion is Planned Parenthood’s largest source of self-sufficient clinical income; 51 percent of their clinical revenue, to be exact.
Some may argue that I’m being unfair and that Planned Parenthood provides a plethora of other services to women that don’t include abortion. Surely this proves Planned Parenthood cares about women’s health, right?
For the past three years, abortion is one of the few services that has increased at Planned Parenthood, while sadly other vital services to women’s health have gone to the wayside. Since 2013, the frequency of pap tests has decreased 35 percent, prenatal care by 35 percent, breast exams and breast care by 23 percent, HPV vaccinations by 10 percent, colposcopy procedures by 18 percent, and cryotherapy procedures by 37 percent, just to name a few. If Planned Parenthood truly has a vested interest in the health of their patients, why are vital services in rapid decline?
Women don’t seek services at this organization to plan for their parenthood; they go to prevent it.