Caroline Gonzalez
English 110
A trip without the kids
There aren’t a lot of public clinics that can offer sex health information and services in NYC. Planned Parenthood opens the door to many patients who need this type of primary health services for the public. However, there are very few clinics of Planned Parenthood in NYC. In fact there are only 4 locations across all 5 boroughs, 1 is located in the lower east side of Manhattan and the one location in Brooklyn. The Bronx, Queens and Staten Island also only have one Planned Parenthood in their whole entire borough. Women in low income areas benefit from this services and it would benefit them to have more locations in NYC because it can help reduce unwanted pregnancies, STI, etc. It also creates a long waiting list for people who want to use the resources that Planned Parenthood provides when there aren’t many locations available.
Impoverish clinic
Planned Parenthood is the nation’s leading sexual and reproductive health care provider. Planned Parenthood receives federal funding to help practice the services they provide, although some groups of people believe that funding this organization is wrong. Some may argue that having Planned Parenthood clinics open is unnecessary since there are other options for seeking primary care. However, more than half of Planned Parenthood clinics are found more in underserved communities. Planned Parenthood should have more funding and have more clinics available in low income areas like in The Bronx.
It is argued that Planned Parenthood is not necessarily the only option there is to seek for primary seaxual health. According to The Susan B Blog, “ women have other options for seeking primary care, contraception, STI testing and cancer screening. According to the Chiaroscuro Foundation, “in addition to the tends of tens of thousands of U.S doctors and hospitals providing this care, there were 1,048 federally qualified health centers in the U.S.” This argument shows that it is not necessary to have Planned Parenthood clinics open because there are so many other public spaces that can provide the same sources as Planned Parenthood. However, Planned Parenthood helps low income patients who don’t have insurance and provide lower cost procedures compared to state funded clinics.
Planned Parenthood is located in a lot of rural areas and communities that doesn’t provide birth control. According to I Stand with Planned Parenthood, “ nearly one-third of all women in need of publicly funded birth control live in counties where Planned Parenthood is the primary safety-net health care provider.” This can demonstrate that people who are in poor communities and in rural areas can rely more for access to primary care through Planned Parenthood because more than half of Planned Parenthood’s health centers are in rural and underserved communities.
I believe that there should be more Planned Parenthood clinics available in low-income communities like The Bronx. The Bronx only has one Planned Parenthood in its entire borough. Even though there are other clinics that can be found that also provides the same sources as Planned Parenthood, it’s not always guaranteed to be free of charge or have a reduced fee if the patient doesn’t have medical insurance. Planned Parenthood says, “patients find that Planned Parenthood health care fees are very reasonable, especially when compared to other doctors’ offices.” This makes it more of an affordable option for patients who don’t have legal documentation and want to look for a primary care.
There aren’t a lot of public clinics that can offer sex health information and services in NYC. Planned Parenthood opens the door to many patients who need this type of primary health services for the public. However, there are very few clinics of Planned Parenthood in NYC. In fact there are only 4 locations across all 5 boroughs, 1 is located in the lower east side of Manhattan and the one location in Brooklyn. The Bronx, Queens and Staten Island also only have one Planned Parenthood in their whole entire borough. Women in low income areas benefit from this services and it would benefit them to have more locations in NYC because it can help reduce unwanted pregnancies, STI, etc. It also creates a long waiting list for people who want to use the resources that Planned Parenthood provides when there aren’t many locations available.
This is The Bronx’ Planned Parenthood location. As you can see from this image, this clinic has a shared space with other offices in this building. There is also no sign that there is a Planned Parenthood clinic inside this building. This shows that Planned Parenthood is low funded especially in low income areas like The Bronx making the clinics difficult to be recognizable for people who don’t know where the clinic is. With this location being in the south Bronx, it helps a lot of people who are low income or don’t have insurance.
Ultimately, what is at stake here is that people in low income areas don’t have enough resources or many options to have a choice over their bodies. This can result in a higher teen pregnancy rates in poor communities, pointing to the fact that The Bronx has the highest pregnancy rate in all NYC. If Planned Parenthood is more funded then more people are going to have the option to make a choice for their bodies in a more affordable way.
Works Cited:
- “Top 12 Reasons to Defund Planned Parenthood Now.” Susan B. Anthony List, The Suzy B Blog, 20 July 2017, https://www.sba-list.org/suzy-b-blog/top-12-reasons-defund-planned-parenthood-now.
- “Maternal, Child & Adolescent Health.” LA County Department of Public Health, http://publichealth.lacounty.gov/mch/ReproductiveHealth/FAMILIA/FamilyPlanning_Contraception.htm.