Planned Parenthood has come under fire again, this time for its practice of selling aborted baby parts to biotec companies for cost or profit – either one is equally despicable. The defenders claim that the cost $30 – $100 per part is simply a recovery of expenses and therefore of no consequence. With an average of 1 million abortions per year in the US alone, Planned Parenthood admits to about 1/3. A $30 cost per ‘part’; liver, heart, lung, head, legs and arms (8 parts per fetus) would benefit Planned Parenthood to the tune of $80 million at an intake of $30 each. At $100 per part the rake would amount to $280 million per year potentially.
Total revenue from all sources for Planned Parenthood was about $1.2 billion in 2013, of which, $500 million came from the government. Expenses totaled $1.15 billion. While the federal government is prohibited from granting money for abortion, the clinic steadfastly claims that is only a small portion of it’s service, but if we extrapolate mathematically, the potential income from body part sales could be nearly one half it’s entire budget! Not the disproportionate amount they claim.
So far, the defense on behalf of Planned Parenthood have four claims. One; the body parts qualify as ’tissue’ and therefore are not regulated by law. Secondly; they claim that the tissue donation provides lifesaving scientific research. Thirdly; they claim the video and report comes from a discredited pro-life organization. Fourth; they claim that they get the consent of each and every woman before extracting the ’tissue’ through ‘partial abortion’ methods.
ONE: What is ’tissue’? There are four types; muscle, epethilial, nervous and connective. To extract these ’tissues’, entire organs and limbs are severed from the body. While organs and limbs are ‘made up’ of tissue, they are not defined as tissue for the purpose of medical use. To define more explicitly; embryonic cells are cells that have been fertilized in in-vitro fertilization clinics and then donated for research. Cells from a woman’s body are specifically excluded. Although even this method is considered contemptuous by Christians.
More plainly, extracting tissue involves extracting ‘cells’, not entire body parts. As in, a tissue sample to determine cancer does not include severing a leg to analyze and biopsy.
SECOND: This is not really a claim at all, but a justification and is of no consequence because it is against the law.
THIRD: The organizations that are attempting to discredit the Center For Medical Progress (Who made the video/sting) include Media Matters, funded by George Soros, Daily Kos, funded by George Soros, Think Progress, funded by George Soros, and New York Times journalists who are radically liberal. They attempt to denounce the investigation as unfair because it was a ‘sting’. and denounce the maker of the video because he is an advocate for pro-life and has been for many years. But that hardly discredits him or the video any more than we would discredit a police sting because they are biased for law. The logic is bizarre. Everyone has a belief o some sort, a belief does not make them not credible.
But the contention goes on to implicate and discredit The Center For Medical Progress founder by associating him with previous sting operations including the ACORN debacle from 2008. Of course, given that the founder of the center for Medical Progress would have been about 18 at the time is noteworthy. Again the ACORN controversial history was justified and cleansed by – Media Matter’s George Soros. The discredit isn’t based on truth but an innuendo of something completely unrelated. The entire transcript and video WERE released without edit.
FOUR: The fourth claim by Planned Parenthood states that every woman who donates ’tissue’ gives prior consent. But no such consent form is on the Planned Parenthood site – at least not yet!
I visited the site for Planned Parenthood and tried to find the consent form that specifically addresses the ’tissue donation’. When I tried to open the pages for Texas and Louisiana laws, I received an error 503 service unavailable message…It did come back online, but the consent form made no mention of tissue donations whatsoever.
Planned Parenthood is rife with past controversies; teaching sex education in California, post-birth abortions, their opposition to over-the-counter birth control, their 2013 Susan B Komen controversy and stem cell research, and not to mention the controversial law which prohibits the government from funding abortions and Planned Parenthood’s justification by stating they perform other procedures as well. A former employee estimated that PP profited about $350 per abortion. They have ‘acknowledged they perform about 335,000 per year – at $350 profit = $117.5 million ‘bottom line’.
Please note: Profit is not Revenue – it is pure bottom line AFTER expenses. The actual Revenue/Cost for an abortion ranges from $1000 to $1500 which would then generate about $400 million in actual abortion revenue, or roughly 57% of total revenue before government grants.
In the UK most us are very suspicious of the interplay between private sector business and healthcare. I’m not pretending that the NHS is perfect, or that we don’t have problems in various aspects of it, but by and large one area where there is little problem is in the area of ethics. Nowadays the principle that the feelings of the patient should come first in all such decisions generally holds. There was a scandal a few years ago about material from aborted foetuses being used for research with out the parent’s permission, but it was a big issue and woe betide anyone caught doing it now.
Makes me lose site of humanity – but then I know I can’t
Scenarios of horror, $ profit or not