In 2011, the Texas legislature voted to ban medical providers affiliated with organizations that perform abortions from participating in the state-run Women’s Health Program, even if the providers did not perform abortions themselves.
At the time, the state’s Women’s Health Program received $9 in federal Medicaid funding for every $1 of state money, and the federal government threatened to pull all Medicaid funding if the legislature did not rescind the ban.
Texas decided to forego federal funds for women’s health care in favor of funding the Women’s Health Program with state money. The new state Program began January 1st.
Whether the new Program includes enough health care providers for the women formerly served by Planned Parenthood is a matter of debate, according to Ben Philpott, senior reporter for KUT in Austin. While the state estimates that 20,000 former Planned Parenthood patients will need new providers, Planned Parenthood says it formerly served 48,000 low-income women.
As the state funded program begins, Texas lawmakers are also grappling with their decision to cut $73 million from other Texas family planning programs. In a recent study, the state’s Health and Human Services Commission noted, as the Texas Tribune writes, “in the 2014 – 2015 biennium poor women will deliver an estimated 23,760 more babies than they would have as a result of their reduced access to state-subsidized birth control.”