Last week, women across the nation were outraged when the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation pulled funding from Planned Parenthood.
Planned Parenthood, an organization committed to helping underprivileged and financially unstable women in their sexual health, has received funding from Komen for five years.
Both Planned Parenthood and Komen are interested in the health and wellness of women and are strongly involved in preventing breast cancer and urging women to get screenings often.
Unfortunately, Komen’s former senior vice president, Karen Handel, has been opposed to the Planned Parenthood message since her appointment in 2011.
The health of women should not be a political issue.
But Handel made the issue political when she stated, “I do not support the mission of Planned Parenthood” and pledged to eliminate funding for breast and cervical cancer screenings.
Over the past five years, Komen has funded 170,000 clinical breast exams and 6,400 mammogram referrals.
Without this funding, hundreds of thousands of women would not have been able to receive screenings.
Women’s health and abortion are not one in the same, nor should they be treated as if they were.
Yes, Planned Parenthood employs clinics that perform abortions.
But cutting off funding for abortions makes funding for cancer screenings an innocent bystander.
It isn’t fair to cut funding provided to women who use Planned Parenthood services to prevent life threatening diseases simply because one high-ranking official decided she doesn’t agree with Roe v. Wade.
After much uproar and backlash from not only feminist groups, but also individual women, Komen reinstated funding to Planned Parenthood.
Handel resigned on Tuesday as the senior vice president of the organization, stating Planned Parenthood employed “vicious attacks and coercion” against her.
Planned Parenthood will continue providing women’s health services, which includes abortions.