Ind. Senate approves cutting Planned Parenthood funds

Indiana could become the first state to end Medicaid coverage for Planned Parenthood services, after the Senate on Tuesday approved a bill that would cut off taxpayer money to the reproductive health-care provider.

"The taxpayers will no longer fund an organization that provides abortion as part of their services that they give to the public," said Sen. Michael Young, R-Indianapolis, a co-sponsor of the measure.

The Senate voted 35-13 to approve House Bill 1210, which also shortens the window in which women can have abortions and mandates that doctors make certain statements to patients seeking the procedure.

"It does in my opinion help women," said the bill's sponsor, Sen. Patricia Miller, R-Indianapolis. "It helps them with objective scientific information."

The measure requires doctors to tell women seeking abortions that the procedure has been linked to infertility. The bill also sets 20 weeks as the cutoff when a woman no longer may seek an abortion. The current cutoff is viability, which a doctor determines, usually around 24 weeks.

No other state has cut off Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood. The Kansas Legislature is considering a similar measure.

A federal measure to defund Planned Parenthood, being pushed at the national level by U.S. Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., recently died in the U.S. Senate.

Planned Parenthood of Indiana says cutting off its $3 million in government funding would put at risk the services it provides to 22,000 low-income Hoosiers, including birth control pills, cancer screenings and sexually transmitted disease tests. The group predicted the move would cost Indiana $68 million in Medicaid expenses for unintended pregnancies.

"It makes absolutely no sense to reduce access to birth control when the objective is to reduce the incidence of abortion," said Betty Cockrum, president of Planned Parenthood of Indiana.

Ending taxpayer funding would seriously jeopardize eight health centers that serve low-income Hoosiers across the state, Cockrum said. It also would keep Medicaid clients from visiting any of Planned Parenthood's 28 Indiana locations.

"We're sort of cutting off our nose to spite our face," said Sen. Tim Lanane, D-Anderson. "The most effective way to prevent unwanted pregnancies and to prevent a woman from having to make that horrible decision about whether to keep a child or not is access to family planning."

Proponents of the measure say other clinics could provide contraceptives and cancer screenings. One such clinic, Open Door Health Services, said it plans to double its patient capacity to 34,000 by 2014.

Sue Swayze, legislative director of Indiana Right to Life, said there are about 100 other clinics now that could offer services to low-income Hoosier women.

"You can buy some types of contraceptive devices at Walmart," she said.

But Gayla Winston of the Indiana Family Health Council, which distributes and audits federal funds provided to health centers, said Indiana has huge gaps in services for low-income women. Without Planned Parenthood, she said, there would be no clinic south of Monroe County and east of Dubois County where a woman could get free birth control pills.

A 2008 study by the Guttmacher Institute, which tracks reproductive health policy nationwide, found that 31 percent of Indiana women who need contraceptives have those needs met. That's 10 percentage points lower than the national average.

Abortions make up about 3 percent of the services Planned Parenthood provides nationwide. No taxpayer money pays for the procedure, which is covered with patient fees and private donations, but it does pay for contraception and disease screening at Planned Parenthood.

About 25 Planned Parenthood employees and supporters showed up at the Statehouse about 3 p.m., chanting and waving signs in opposition to the bill. In March, a rally to support Planned Parenthood drew about 500 Hoosiers, including Jamy Carlton, 29, Franklin, who was diagnosed with cervical cancer after a Planned Parenthood checkup when she was 23 and lacked health insurance.

"They helped me to get help and to be cancer-free today," Carlton said.

Republican Sens. Vaneta Becker of Evansville, Phil Boots of Crawfordsville, Luke Kenley of Noblesville and Sue Landske of Cedar Lake crossed party lines to vote against the bill. Democratic Sens. Lindel Hume of Princeton, Tim Skinner of Terre Haute and Richard Young of Milltown were the only Democrats to vote for it.

Becker said she supported the bill before the Senate added the measure to defund Planned Parenthood, "but I cannot support it when it takes away preventative health-care services for low-income women."

The amended bill now goes back to the House for approval. That body has approved a version of the bill that did not contain the measure to defund Planned Parenthood. The governor will review the final language if it reaches his desk, his spokeswoman said.