CA gives Planned Parenthood $140 million to keep clinics open

from Kristen HuangCalMatters

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After months of financial stress, Planned Parenthood will receive a $140 million bailout to offset losses suffered after Congress cut health care funding in JulyGov. Gavin Newsom announced Thursday.

The money will help Planned Parenthood keep 109 clinics open in California. In a statement, Newsom said the move reflects the state’s continued commitment to abortion and reproductive health care.

“Trump’s efforts to defund Planned Parenthood put all of our communities at risk as people seek essential health care from these community providers,” Newsom said.

Lawmakers will also take up the issue in January when the Legislature reconvenes.

The news comes a week after the nonprofit announced it would do so elimination of primary care at clinics in Orange and San Bernardino counties. Five other clinics also closed in July in the Bay Area, Santa Cruz and Central Valley, all in response to the federal funding freeze.

Planned Parenthood needs roughly $27 million a month to operate all of its local facilities, according to Jody Hicks, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California, the organization’s statewide advocacy group.

“We are extremely grateful that we have found a way to provide funding to our Planned Parenthood health centers so they can continue to operate and continue services,” Hicks said.

California is the fourth next state Washington, Colorado and New Mexicoto pledge public funds to keep Planned Parenthood afloat. Lawmakers in Oregon and New York are also considering similar moves.

Republicans have criticized and targeted Planned Parenthood for decades over its contraceptive and abortion services. A 1977 law barred federal funding for abortions, but this summer President Donald Trump took additional steps to cut the nation’s largest abortion provider.

His sweeping tax and budget bill bars Planned Parenthood from receiving Medicaid dollars for any services, including mammograms, Pap smears, birth control and sexually transmitted infection testing and treatment.

According to Planned Parenthood, abortions account for less than 10 percent of services, while other reproductive health services make up the majority of medical care provided.

Losses in federal funding have forced Planned Parenthood to close clinics across the country where half of all patients rely on Medicaid. In California, where 80 percent of Planned Parenthood patients have Medicaid—known as Medi-Cal in the state – the losses are even greater.

“It’s definitely had a huge impact on California,” Hicks said.

Primary care closings are making waves across the state

Democratic lawmakers, Newsom and Planned Parenthood have spent most of the year seeking a funding solution that protects access to reproductive health without cash from the federal treasury. But faced with a multibillion-dollar government deficit, solutions are slow to emerge and challenging to sustain.

“We’re going to fight like hell to preserve access to care in the coming months and years,” said Assembly Majority Leader Cecilia Aguiar-Curry, D-Davis, who leads the House Women’s Caucus.

Even with the state’s pledge to protect sexual and reproductive health care, Planned Parenthood clinics face growing uncertainty brought on by a federal grant freeze, court cases and even some proposed state cuts.

Last week, Planned Parenthood of Orange and San Bernardino counties announced that the facilities will close primary care services on December 13. The group, which operates nine health centers, added primary care more than a decade ago to serve low-income patients who couldn’t find appointments elsewhere.

Dr. Janet Jacobson, medical director of the clinics in Orange and San Bernardino counties, said the federal action “destroys our primary care program.” She said she worries that patients with urgent mental health needs or chronic illnesses won’t be able to quickly find another provider. Many communities in the region have too few doctors, according to government data.

An estimated 13,000 patients will lose access to care, and Planned Parenthood will lay off 77 employees.

“It’s inhumane to take away people’s health care,” Jacobson said. “People who have Medi-Cal should be able to see the primary care provider of their choice.”

Aguiar-Curry called the loss of primary care “unacceptable and dangerous.”

The search for stability as a “financial scale” is still emerging

Farther north, Planned Parenthood Mar Monte — which operates 30 health centers along the California coast, the Central Valley and Nevada — closed five health centers in July, shortly after Trump blocked funding for Planned Parenthood.

Mar Monte CEO Andrew Adams said the organization is working to maintain its financial stability. The closures helped preserve services at the organization’s other clinics through the end of the year, but Adams warned it could hit a “financial cliff” in January.

“We are planning for an environment where there is no federal funding,” Adams said. “This looks like potentially charging patients some amount of money for the services we provide.”

Other Planned Parenthood groups around the state are exploring ways to cut costs and increase revenue while keeping clinics open for patients.

Dr. Neda Ashtari, a former Planned Parenthood and Medi-Cal patient, emphasized the importance of ensuring that more than 1 million patients continue to have access to cancer screenings and other reproductive health services. When Ashtari was a teenager, her mother died of breast cancer after missing routine scans that could have caught the cancer earlier, she said.

“It really crystallized that this preventative care is the difference between life and death,” Ashtari said.

Supported by the California Health Care Foundation (CHCF), which works to ensure that people have access to the care they need, when they need it, at a cost they can afford. Visit www.chcf.org to learn more.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and is republished under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives license.