\n<\/p>\n
The Trump administration can move forward with its plan to \u201cdefund\u201d Planned Parenthood by blocking it from receiving reimbursements from Medicaid, the US government\u2019s insurance program for low-income people, a federal appeals court ruled late Thursday.<\/p>\n
The ruling from the first US circuit court of appeals lifts a lower court\u2019s preliminary injunction, which had stopped the Trump administration from enacting a provision of its tax and spending bill that axed Planned Parenthood\u2019s ability to participate in Medicaid for one year.<\/p>\n
Now, the reproductive health giant estimates that up to 200 Planned Parenthood clinics may face closure, given that 1.1 million Planned Parenthood patients are eligible for Medicaid.<\/p>\n
\u201cCancers will go undetected, STIs will go untreated and patients won\u2019t get the birth control that they need to plan their families and futures,\u201d Alexis McGill Johnson, chief executive of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, said in a press call on Friday. \u201cPatients will have to travel further to get care and wait longer to get it as demand surges at health centers.\u201d<\/p>\n
More than 60% of the clinics at risk for closure are in rural or \u201cmedically under-served areas\u201d, while roughly 90% of the clinics are located in blue states that currently protect abortion rights, McGill Johnson said. Planned Parenthood clinics provide almost 40% of all US abortions, according to a 2024 report from the independent abortion clinic association Abortion Care Network.<\/p>\n
\u201cMake no mistake, this is a backdoor abortion ban,\u201d McGill Johnson said.<\/p>\n
It is already illegal to use federal dollars, including money from Medicaid, to pay for abortions. In 2024, Planned Parenthood clinics treated people who rely on Medicaid at more than 1.5m visits for services such as STI tests, cancer screenings and contraception. However, because anti-abortion activists see Planned Parenthood as a public enemy, they have spent years trying to convince Republicans to \u201cdefund\u201d Planned Parenthood by kicking it out of Medicaid.<\/p>\n
During the call, McGill Johnson said Planned Parenthood had developed plans that would permit some regional affiliates to stop providing abortions in states where the procedure remains legal, in order to preserve their ability to receive Medicaid. After the call, a Planned Parenthood Federation of America spokesperson said those plans were no longer being considered.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat is not an attempt to walk away from abortion,\u201d McGill Johnson said. \u201cPlanned Parenthood strongly stands behind our need and ability to provide abortion care wherever it is legal in this country. It is simply an opportunity for us to engage our federation to be able to provide the care and also preserve as much funding for reimbursement for the services, just like any other health care provider should be able to do.\u201d<\/p>\n
In an emailed statement, the Planned Parenthood Federation of America spokesperson stressed that \u201cPlanned Parenthood healthcare clinics will continue to provide abortion care everywhere it is lawful to do so\u201d.<\/p>\n
Litigation in the case will continue, as the first circuit is set to hear more substantive arguments in the case in the coming weeks. More than 80 million people in the US use Medicaid, and 11% of female Medicaid beneficiaries who are between the ages of 15 and 49 and who receive family-planning services go to Planned Parenthood, according to an analysis by the non-profit KFF, which tracks healthcare policy.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s no back-up plan. There\u2019s no one waiting in the wings to take care of our patients,\u201d said Dominique Lee, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts, one of the regional Planned Parenthood affiliates that helped bring the lawsuit over the Trump administration\u2019s provision.<\/p>\n
\u201cPlanned Parenthood is the safety net.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Trump administration can move forward with its plan to \u201cdefund\u201d Planned Parenthood by blocking it from receiving reimbursements from Medicaid, the US government\u2019s insurance program for low-income people, a federal appeals court ruled late Thursday. The ruling from the first US circuit court of appeals lifts a lower court\u2019s preliminary injunction, which had stopped<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20873,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[794,847,160,9081,3371,1680,3228,2377,666,81],"class_list":{"0":"post-20872","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-administration","9":"tag-block","10":"tag-court","11":"tag-defund","12":"tag-funds","13":"tag-medicaid","14":"tag-parenthood","15":"tag-planned","16":"tag-rules","17":"tag-trump"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20872","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20872"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20872\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/20873"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20872"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20872"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20872"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}