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Planned Parenthood PA Advocates Applauds Policy Committee for Hearing to Expand Abortion Access

For Immediate Release: March 29, 2023 (Updated: March 29, 2023, 6:59 p.m.)


(Harrisburg, Pa.) --- Planned Parenthood Pennsylvania Advocates thanks the House Democratic Policy Committee for holding a hearing today on expanded access to essential reproductive health care.

“Abortion is legal in Pennsylvania, and with a Governor and House committed to keeping it that way, we are more fortunate than many states – but we still face incredible problems with access to that care,” said Signe Espinoza, Executive Director of Planned Parenthood PA. “Physician-only laws limit where you can get abortion care, mountains of regulation closed 90 percent of the clinics that had operated here as recently as the 1970s, and lack of funding have created an access crisis in Pennsylvania. It doesn’t matter if abortion is legal if you can’t actually get one. Thank you to the members of this committee for tackling the access issue so many patients face – particularly those in rural communities or in poverty.”

Millions of women in the US rely on abortions as part of their reproductive health care, but access to facilities providing abortions are declining. States can expand access to reproductive health care by allowing qualified advanced-practice clinicians (“APCs”) to provide abortions. Abortion is one of the safest medical procedures performed in the United States and data from the CDC shows that abortion has over a 99 percent safety record. Physician-only laws single out abortion for different treatment without medical justification. Multiple studies show that there is no difference in complication rate or patient experience when APCs perform medication or procedural abortions as opposed to physicians.

Allowing APCs to perform abortion would expand access to reproductive health care in a simple and meaningful way. Numerous professional and health care organizations, including the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), the American Public Health Association (APHA), the American Academy of Physicians Assistants, (AAPA) the World Health Organization (WHO), and the National Abortion Federation (NAF), among others, have confirmed that trained APCs can safely and effectively provide abortions.

 

For more information on PPPA and access to abortion care in Pennsylvania, please visit our website.

 MEDIA CONTACT: Brittany Crampsie, 717 712 3480

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ABOUT PLANNED PARENTHOOD PENNSYLVANIA ADVOCATES

Planned Parenthood Pennsylvania Advocates (PPPA) exists to create a Pennsylvania where sexual and reproductive healthcare, including abortion, is accessible, affordable, and affirming for all. We achieve this, in partnership with the 3 Planned Parenthood affiliates in Pennsylvania, through electoral and advocacy campaigns, lobbying, and organizing.

 

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