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So clinics face difficult choices. PPFA's Austin affiliate recently sustained a forty-five percent cut in federal funding. Austin PPFA officials decided to tell 6,000 clients they were no longer eligible for services at the downtown location. Then they cut that clinic's hours from fifty-five a week to twenty-four; it's now dedicated to women twenty-four and younger. "We hope women twenty-five and over will be able to use one of our for-fee clinics," says Tierney, with a sigh.
Of course, many of those women can't afford to. Last year, a government study found that adult women were opting out of birth control in surprising numbers. "It seems to represent access problems and affordability," says Jeffrey Jensen, director of the Women's Health Research Unit at Oregon Health and Science University. Even patients with private insurance often can't afford the co-payments. Plus, he adds, drug companies have cut back on free samples. As a result, women turn to less-effective types of birth control and run a greater risk of unwanted pregnancy.
Though other federally funded clinics face the same constraints as PPFA, there are a few other options for women seeking low-cost birth control. College health centers are one. (One woman was given a year's supply of the Pill when she graduated.) The online pharmacy smartwomanrx.com offers inexpensive pills, though it only carries a few brand names. It can be cheaper to buy
emergency contraception in advance and keep it on hand, just in case: not-2-late.com has a list of providers around the country
(though not how much they charge). Additionally, the PPFA website shows how to use regular birth-control pills as emergency contraception if necessary.
Beyond voting for candidates who support family planning, women who get health care at PPFA and can afford to pay the higher price on the sliding scale should do so (as one woman pointed out, if you have enough money to buy the Diet Coke to drink on the way there, you should be prepared to pay something). If you're in a financial
bind, you can tell the nurse or doctor you want to go on birth control, then tell them how much you can afford to pay. In her book The War on Choice: The Right-Wing Attack on Women's Rights and How to Fight Back (Bantam), Feldt cites the successful campaigns to get insurance plans to cover contraception; she suggests going to covermypills.com for information on how to take action. She also notes that the Prevention First Act — which would dramatically increase Title X funding, increase access to emergency contraception, and require sex education to be medically accurate, among other provisions that would expand access to reproductive health care — is languishing in Congress because the anti-choice leadership won't let it come up for a vote. "The votes are there for passage, were it to come to the floor of Congress," she says. "Grassroots pressure could make that happen. That's where joining organizations with alert networks, writing letters to the editor, raising the issue at your members of Congress' town halls, and stirring up your friends can make a big difference." Certainly, PPFA can't fight these battles alone.
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| ABOUT THE AUTHOR: |
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Kara Jesella is a freelance writer in New York City. She is currently co-writing a book on Sassy magazine for Farrar, Straus & Giroux. |
©2006 Kara Jesella and Nerve.com
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