Family planning services benefit both sides of abortion issue

It's undeniable that abortion has become a wedge issue in American politics, creating countless single-issue voters and a cultural divide separating Americans since the 1970s.


For more than 30 years the battle between the ‘pro-life' and ‘pro-choice' sides has essentially generated a stalemate in rational discourse between the two camps. The terminology itself – disingenuously simple yet politically loaded – not only obscures nuanced discussion but prevents truly meaningful debate and consensus.


At the very least, both sides should agree on one thing – reducing the number of abortions. Nebraska State Sen. Danielle Nantkes' LB370, which expands access to family planning services, seeks to do just that.


Yet given this opportunity to reduce abortions and their root causes – poverty, limited access to health care and a simple lack of sexual education – Nebraska Right to Life has signaled it will oppose the bill before debate can even begin. Although it doesn't fund abortion counseling or procedures, the bill is being argued against from a ‘pro-life' framework.


What's so threatening about greater access to family planning services?

Such services include pelvic examinations, pap smears, STD screening and treatment, pregnancy tests, birth control and other pregnancy-related services. It also encompasses educational outreach to foster healthy communication and relationships, STD prevention and responsible sexual decision making.


These services are often out of reach for working-class Americans.


LB370 would allow families earning at or below 185 percent of the federal poverty level to become eligible for assistance for family planning services funded through Medicaid.


In 2008, the federal poverty level for an average family of four stood at $21,200. Under LB370, families earning at or below approximately $38,000 would qualify for subsidized family planning services. Households of two would be eligible at or under $25,200 and $31,680 for families of three.

LB370 would expand family planning services to cover more low-income and

working-class families who earn just too much to qualify for benefits.


Moreover, LB370 would relieve Nebraska taxpayers of having to foot the bulk of the services' bill. It would require the Department of Health and Human Services to apply for Medicaid waivers with the federal government, ultimately picking up 90 percent of costs.


With state budgets currently struggling to make ends meet, LB370 will increase access to family planning without straining Nebraska's budget. Subsidizing family planning initiatives will potentially save Nebraska millions of dollars over the long run through preventative care.

According to a national study of growing family planning programs commissioned by the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the states of Arkansas and Oregon respectively saved $30 million and $20 million in a year.


Expanding family planning services to low-income and working-class families will avert unplanned pregnancies from occurring in the first place, diminish the contraction of STDs, assist families in preparing for sustainable and healthy families and reduce the need for abortions.


So why is Nebraska Right to Life opposing LB370?

Two words: Planned Parenthood.


For Nebraska Right to Life, increasing working people's access to family planning services is seen as code word for backdoor funding of abortions. While the bill doesn't specifically focus funding to Planned Parenthood facilities, Nebraska Right to Life recognizes that Planned Parenthood provides an extensive proportion of the available health services to men and women in the Omaha and Lincoln areas.

Nebraska Right to Life seeks to prevent as many funds as it can from reaching groups like Planned Parenthood. Besides denying funds to many other clinics and groups in the process, the ultimate side effect, if successful, is denying thousands of Nebraskans crucial services that actually prevent abortions and foster healthy families.


Just look at Planned Parenthood's services: In one year they provide more than 3.3 million STD tests and treatments, prevent 621,000 unintended pregnancies, administer almost one million Pap tests and 850,000 breast exams and provide educational outreach to more than 1.2 million adolescents and adults.


The organization claims that 82 percent of its services help prevent unintended pregnancies.


But rather than attempt to approach a common goal of addressing abortion's root causes – unplanned pregnancies, poverty, limited health care and a lack of sexual education – to reduce the number of abortion procedures, Nebraska Right to Life instead clings to a "with us or against us" mentality.

In the process, Nebraska Right to Life is opposing initiatives that create self-sufficient and healthy families.


Of course, it's difficult to do away with the absolutist rhetoric that prevents us from reducing the frequency of abortions. It's a goal we can all agree upon. But if we have a true and genuine commitment to this goal, we need to put aside our old, divisive rhetoric and have a renewed willingness to open dialogue on the issue.


LB370 not only offers the possibility of addressing the root causes of abortions, but it also offers the possibility that we can elevate debate in Nebraska to a less-partisan level. To do that, we first need to avoid letting common sense initiatives like promoting family planning services for working Nebraskans get clouded in the politically-loaded ‘pro-life' / ‘pro-choice' rhetoric.

Nic Swiercek is a Graduate History Student. reach him at opinion@dailynebraskan.com.