Gov. Brownback’s latest attack on Planned Parenthood is shameful and threatens the ability of Kansans to get basic health care

OVERLAND PARK, Kan. – Earlier today, the Kansas Department of Health and Environment terminated Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri’s participation in Medicaid. Ten other current and former Planned Parenthood medical providers were similarly terminated. The action by the Department of Health and Environment was taken despite an April 19 letter from the federal Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, reiterating that Medicaid recipients have the right to receive services from any Medicaid-eligible provider and that states are prohibited from excluding providers simply because the provider also offers certain reproductive healthcare services.

The following statement in response to the Department’s action can be attributed to Micah W. Kubic, Executive Director of the ACLU of Kansas:

“Today’s action by the Brownback administration is only the latest attack to in a long campaign of harassment and intimidation of women seeking reproductive healthcare and doctors who provide it. This attack on Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri is part of a broad, consistent pattern by extremists to interfere with the personal decision-making abilities of women, block access to reproductive health care, and ignore or circumvent court decisions they don’t like.

Most shameful of all, today’s action by the governor and his administration could have debilitating consequences on the health of Kansas. Terminating Planned Parenthood’s participation in Medicaid will threaten the ability of Kansans to get basic preventive health care, including lifesaving cancer screenings and health exams. Many Kansas women and men rely on Planned Parenthood as the provider of those services.

Kansans should have the freedom to consider all of the medical options available to them, regardless of how little money they make, how they are insured, or where they live. Gov. Brownback’s action strips that freedom away, all in service of an extremist agenda of hostility, harassment, and intimidation of women making difficult decisions about their own reproductive healthcare.”