‘They're playing politics with people's lives': Trump's big bill would slash Planned Parenthood's Mass. budget in half
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Ireland, a practicing OB/GYN and assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology at UMass Memorial Medical Center and UMass Chan Medical School in Worcester, said that in just the past several days, she treated three women with widely different medical needs at the league's clinics.
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One had pre-cancer of the cervix. Another had a sexually transmitted disease that she caught from an unfaithful partner. And a third was about to start a pre-med program at an Ivy League school, got pregnant, and wanted an abortion.
'We provide excellent care based on quality and patient satisfaction and I hate to see that threatened,' Ireland said.
The league has four clinics in Boston, Marlborough, Springfield, and Worcester, although abortions are not performed at the one in Marlborough. The clinics provide services such as birth control, Pap smears, breast exams and abortions.
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The league provided 9,462 abortions last year, and more than half of them were achieved using a combination of two medications, mifepristone and misoprostol.
Federal law, specifically the 1977 Hyde Amendment, already bans states from using federal Medicaid dollars to pay for abortions. Massachusetts, like more than a dozen mostly blue states, uses its own funds to cover abortions for Medicaid recipients. The legislation that President Trump and Republicans in Congress are pushing would affect federal money that covers other medical services and helps keep clinics running.
Michael King, president of the Massachusetts Family Institute, an anti-abortion rights group,
said there are 'plenty of other clinics that can address those needs' in Massachusetts if Congress approves the Medicaid cuts.
He noted that Planned Parenthood said it performed 402,000 abortions nationwide in its 2023-24 annual report, which King called a record number.
He also cited a recent study by the Washington-based Ethics and Public Policy Center, a think tank that says it applies 'the riches of the Jewish and Christian traditions' to law, culture, and politics. The study found that 11 percent of women who had medication abortions experienced serious adverse complications.
This rate, which has been cited by Republican members of Congress, was significantly higher than the less than 0.5 percent rate found in clinical trials by the US Food and Drug Administration.
'If Planned Parenthood clinics closing means that the number of abortions declined, then we are very pleased that the lives of more babies will be saved in Massachusetts,' King said.
Critics of the Medicaid cuts, however, said congressional Republicans are using the so-called 'Big Beautiful Bill' to knee-cap an organization that they have long opposed.
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Although Planned Parenthood isn't mentioned in the bill, 'all they needed to add was it rhymes with wood or Hollywood,' said Fabiola De Liban, director of sexual and reproductive health at the National Health Law Program, in Los Angeles.
Ireland said that if the House approves the bill containing the Medicaid cuts, the Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts is committed to keeping the doors of all four clinics open and maintaining services.
She said the league might seek to provide other services to bolster income, including vasectomies and treatment for perimenopause, the physical and emotional symptoms that often appear as a woman approaches menopause. Perimenopausal care includes hormone therapy, vaginal creams, and certain medications that can help manage symptoms like hot flashes and mood changes.
Jonathan Saltzman can be reached at
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