Missouri lawmakers have passed a budget which allows the United States money to spend millions to bar Planned Parenthood from accessing the federal government's funds.
The Legislature officially barred a large amount of $8.3 million in federal Medicaid funding. The state was set to be distributed for family planning, sexually transmitted disease testing and pelvic examinations at county health departments, health care facilities, and Planned Parenthood itself.
The legislators replaced the barred funds with money from Missouri's general revenues. Their decision resulted to an unchanged total amount of $10.8 million. They stipulated that none of the money could go to organizations that provide abortions as Planned Parenthood does, The News and Observer has learned.
According to the letter for the Medicaid directors, the federal government has ruled that their money cannot fund non-emergency abortions, however, states are prohibited from barring Medicaid money from abortion providers and their services like vaccinations and cancer screenings, OA Online reports.
Senator Kurt Schaefer, the chairman appropriations committee of the Columbian Republican stated, "Medicaid patients can still go to county health departments, rural health clinics, and federally qualified health centers. If someone wants to go to Planned Parenthood, they're free to do that. Taxpayers in Missouri just aren't going to pay for it anymore", as quoted by The Chicago Tribune.
The budget for fiscal year that starts on July 1 devotes nearly $11 million to services such as family planning and pelvic examinations for women with low salaries on Medicaid. Most of the money would normally come from the federal government, which says, states must allow women to use it at Planned Parenthood.
When the Missouri lawmakers initially proposed blocking Medicaid payments from Planned Parenthood last March, budget staffers estimated less than $400,000 in Medicaid payments go to Missouri's 13 Planned Parenthood clinics for procedures and drug medications.
Planned Parenthood serves more than 50,000 patients per annum in Missouri, and about 7,000 of them are on Medicaid. Family Planning is the easiest public funding stream for lawmakers to target because it has one of the biggest budget.
