Contraception Fell, Medicaid Births Rose When Texas Defunded Planned Parenthood

http://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-care/contraception-fell-medicaid-births-went-when-texas-defunded-planned-parenthood-n510736

by Maggie Fox
Feb. 3, 2016

Women stopped using the most effective types of contraception and more babies were born on the government's tab after Texas cut off funding from Planned Parenthood clinics, a team of Texas researchers said Wednesday.

The number of claims for long-acting contraception plummeted by more than a third and births paid for by Medicaid rose 27 percent, the team at the University of Texas at Austin reported.

"This change is worrisome, since increased access to long-acting, reversible contraception methods is a priority of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and one study has indicated substantial unmet demand for long-acting, reversible contraception methods in Texas," they wrote in their report, published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

This new research shows the devastating consequences for women when politicians block access to care at Planned Parenthood. Politicians have claimed time and again that our patients can simply go to other health care providers — and tragically that's not the case. Instead, women were left out in the cold," Cecile Richards, president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, said in a statement.

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