Penn ACTION teamed up with Raising Women’s Voices of Southeastern PA on Thursday, February 17 when over 100 supporters of women’s health and health care reform rallied in Philadelphia in view of City Hall.
Chants of “We won’t go back!” punctuated addresses from State Sen. Lawrence Farnese, State Rep. Babette Josephs, Carol Tracy from the Women’s Law Project, Brenda Shelton Dunston of the Black Women’s Health Alliance, Dayle Steinberg from Planned Parenthood Southeastern PA, Kistine Carolan of the Maternity Care Coalition and Penn ACTION’s Marc Stier.
As Stier pointed out, the attacks on women are not confined to attempts to role back access to reproductive care to the dark ages of back alley abortions, the attacks also extend to repealing the Affordable Care Act, which does more than any law in recent memory to bring women’s access to quality care into parity with men’s.
With Planned Parenthood the target of possibly unconstitutional legislation, defense of the medical service provider was a priority for several of the speakers. Carol Tracy urged the crowd not to let win the current attacks on an organization that “has gone to jail for us.” Brenda Shelton Dunston described Planned Parenthood as a place where black women “feel comfortable in going to seek quality health care.” Dayle Steinberg assured supporters that Planned Parenthood is here to stay. Kistine Carolan reminded us that “budget cuts and blocking health reform will put the health of women and families in jeopardy.” Senator Farnese and Rep. Josephs both wondered why Harrisburg is spending time blocking women’s access to health care instead of creating jobs that the commonwealth so desperately needs.
Please take a minute to sign on to our petition at PAforWomensHealth.org. Deliveries of signatures begin the week of February 21 in Bucks County with a visit to Rep. Fitzpatrick’s office. Rep. Fitzpatrick voted for repeal of the Affordable Care Act and is an original cosponsor of H.R. 3, which allows an incest exception only for minors and until recently attempted to redefine rape as “forcible rape”. Read more about H.R. 3 at Above Average Jane.
The House of Representatives has already voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act. Today they voted to strip federal funding from Planned Parenthood. Currently, there is legislation pending in both Harrisburg and Washington that aims to stop women from using their own money to purchase health insurance that covers abortion care. In addition, the Continuing Resolution that is coming before Congress the week of Feb. 21st is proposing massive cuts in health care programs that support women and children including the elimination of all federal funding for family planning and reproductive health services as well as deep cuts to maternal and child health programs. All of these proposals will have catastrophic consequences for women and their families. Now is the time to take action. We won’t go back.