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Planned Parenthood announced today that they would decline any reimbursement for “fetal tissue donation.” America’s largest abortion provider claims that changing this policy takes away any basis for attacking what they describe as limited work with fetal tissue donations.
The controversy began when the Center for Medical Progress released a series of videos that highlighted Planned Parenthood’s involvement in providing fetal tissue for money, changing abortion procedures used to provide intact “specimens” and the use of the partial birth abortion procedure all of which, if true, is a violation of federal law.
“As the nation’s leading women’s health care provider, our promise to both our patients and the medical community is that we will never bow to political pressure and we will never back down from advancing women’s health every way we can,” Cecile Richards, President of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, said in a released statement.
“This removes beyond the shadow of a doubt the ludicrous idea that Planned Parenthood has any financial interest in fetal tissue donation – and shows the real agenda behind these attacks. This policy takes away the smokescreen that extremists have been using to attack Planned Parenthood, and lays bare their real agenda. When the attacks in Washington and in states continue, as we unfortunately expect they will, let it be clear once and for all that that they have nothing to do with concern over fetal tissue donation and everything to do with banning abortion in the U.S.,” Richards added.
The Center for Medical Progress called Planned Parenthood’s policy change a “PR stunt” that is essentially an admission of guilt.
“If the money Planned Parenthood has been receiving for baby body parts were truly legitimate ‘reimbursement,’ why cancel it? This proves what CMP has been saying all along—Planned Parenthood incurs no actual costs, and the payments for harvested fetal parts have always been an extra profit margin,” David Daleiden, Human Capital Project Lead with the Center for Medical Progress, said in a released statement.
“Without releasing the text of the alleged new ‘policy’ and the exact model from the their Washington affiliate, Planned Parenthood’s stunt today tells us nothing. This only raises more serious questions about what Planned Parenthood leadership has been allowing its clinics to do with money and baby parts, and intensifies the need for Congress to pursue full auditing and oversight of Planned Parenthood’s unaccountable criminal enterprise of baby parts trafficking,” Daleiden added.
Susan B. Anthony List President Marjorie Dannenfelser called Planned Parenthood’s announcement a “smoke screen.”
“Today’s announcement is a smokescreen by Planned Parenthood to veil the most important issues under public discussion. They destroy growing children in the womb, strategically crush their tiny bodies to extract livers, eyes, hearts, and brains, alter abortion procedures to increase their organ harvest, and even allow infants to be born alive, while frequently misleading women regarding the benefit of fetal tissue donation,” Dannenfelser said in a released statement.
“Those horrors are unchanged and the congressional and state investigations into Planned Parenthood’s gruesome practices should not stop. We are encouraged by the commitments from the House and Senate leaders to use reconciliation to stop taxpayer funding of this abortion business. Those funds would be put to better use at comprehensive health care clinics that provide true women’s health care and do not provide abortion on-demand,” Dannenfelser added.