Charen: PP removing the fig leaf...much to hide...

 

Mona Charen writes of another reason for the furor over the potential defunding of Planned Parenthood ...it  threatened to remove the fig leaf.

The Susan G. Komen decision elicited such a heated response because it threatened to remove the "women's health" fig leaf from PP.

By now, everyone has learned that PP, its own claims notwithstanding, does not provide mammograms. It provides referrals for mammograms. Considering that about 80 percent of PP clients are under the age of 35, and only 5 percent of breast cancers are found in women under the age of 40,

Throughout the Komen imbroglio, PP circulated another misleading statistic — that only 3 percent of PPs services involve abortions. As Charlotte Allen revealed in a 2007 Weekly Standard essay, that figure is, well, inventive. They arrive at that number by counting every service individually. When a client comes in for an abortion, she gets a pregnancy test (one service), a pelvic exam (second service), an STD test (third service), a breast exam (fourth service), a package of contraceptives (fifth service) and so forth. But calculated as a percentage of revenue generated, abortion accounts for about a third of PPs business.
And 1 of out 3 clients who walks into a PP clinic is there for a pregnancy test. A third of those go on to have abortions.
Charlotte Allen drew attention to something else PP wants to obscure — its dedication to providing confidential abortions, even to very young girls, which may be enabling statutory rape. A 14-year-old Cincinnati girl who was impregnated by her 21-year-old soccer coach was brought to a PP clinic by the coach. He paid for the abortion with his credit card. PP asked no questions.

That's why the initial Komen decision was so potentially damaging and elicited such a furious response. Those mammogram referrals are window dressing for a business with plenty to hide.