WASHINGTON, D.C., April 8, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services blasted GOP efforts to defund Planned Parenthood and end Title X family planning funds, saying such a move would only increase abortions.
HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, former governor of Kansas and associate of late-term abortionist George Tiller, told Politico Friday that cutting funding vital to the abortion giant would increase the number of abortions by increasing unintended pregnancies.
“I think it’s really unfortunate Congress can’t come to a resolution on this year’s budget … cutting [Title X] funding would increase the number of unintended pregnancies and increase the number of abortions, so the people who say they’re having this battle about abortion are actually not looking at what the statistics have indicated,” she said.
While contraceptive availability has often been touted as reducing the abortion rate, critics point to several studies that have shown that birth control is linked to an overall increase in the abortion rate. One of the most recent studies on the correlation, conducted in Spain, found that the country’s abortion rate more than doubled in the same time period that contraceptive use rose from 49 percent of women to nearly 80 percent.
Meanwhile, redoubled efforts in the UK to spread contraceptive use, such as the morning-after pill, have not managed to put a dent in abortion and rising STD rates; similarly, California’s abnormally high rate of contraceptive use among low-income individuals has coincided with an abortion rate of 24 percent, 5 percent higher than the national average.
Republicans striving to defund Planned Parenthood and Title X in this year’s budget bill have had their arm twisted by Democrats, who have refused to approve a short-term Continuing Resolution to fund the government past midnight Friday unless the GOP caves on abortion and birth control.