[Sosfbay-discuss] [Fwd: [ProChoiceOrNoChoice] Anti-Contraception Zealot (Keroack) to Oversee America's Family Planning Program]

[Jim Stauffer]

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [ProChoiceOrNoChoice] Anti-Contraception Zealot (Keroack) to
         Oversee America's Family Planning Program
   Date: Sun, 17 Dec 2006 23:20:00 -0000
   From: "Judy Purrington" <JudyPurrington at aol.com>
     To: ProChoiceOrNoChoice at yahoogroups.com

This message has been sent to you by the Pro-Choice Coalition of
Santa Clara County.

Dr. Eric Keroack has demonstrated his opposition to contraception and
sex education. Now, he has been appointed to advise the U.S. Health
and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt on issues related to
reproductive health; and more importantly will oversee Title X --
America's 30 year old, successful family planning program. An Anti-
Contraception physician is clearly NOT the right person for that job!

WHAT CAN YOU DO?

1 -- Follow the link below and sign the Planned Parenthood Petition
to Secretary Leavitt, asking that he remove Dr. Keroack.

http://www.ppaction.org/campaign/keroackpetition2/

2 -- Write a Letter to the Editor of your local Daily or Weekly
newspaper. Make it short and to the point. You can find the
submission instructions on the editorial page, and usually on the
newspaper's website.

Who is Eric Keroack?

When Eric Keroack began work as the newly appointed deputy assistant
secretary for population affairs (DASPA) last November, he did so
amid deep concern and fierce criticism. Upon his appointment, pro-
choice, pro-family planning legislators and family planning and
women's health advocates across the United States expressed outrage
that a person who so opposes the basic tools of family planning —
birth control and sex education — would be put in charge of the
nation's family planning program.

As DASPA, Keroack will advise U.S. Health and Human Services
Secretary (HHS) Michael O. Leavitt on vital issues related to
reproductive health and adolescent pregnancy in the United States
and, more important, will oversee Title X — America's family planning
program, which provides high-quality family planning and preventive
health services to millions of low-income individuals each year.

Title X Matters

Title X has a proven track record as a cost-effective program for
preventing unintended pregnancies and improving the health of women.
Since its inception more than 30 years ago, Title X has helped
prevent an estimated 20 million unintended pregnancies. But in that
time, funding for this vital program has dropped by nearly 60
percent, when adjusted for inflation, even as health care costs have
soared and as an increasing number of women are in need of publicly
funded family planning services. According to a recent report by the
Guttmacher Institute, doubling the current Title X budget of $283
million could prevent 244,000 unplanned pregnancies each year and
save Americans roughly $800 million.

But the question remains — what will happen to Title X under
Keroack? Will he favor unproven abstinence-only programs when doling
out education and counseling grants? Will he instate new regulations
for family planning clinics that will make the delivery of medically
accurate, unbiased health information more difficult? Or will he
advocate for more funding for effective pregnancy prevention, such as
comprehensive, medically accurate sex education and birth control
access? Title X is charged with providing "access to contraceptive
supplies and information to all who want and need them," according to
HHS. But Keroack has a history of involvement with organizations
that do exactly the opposite — they promote an anti-contraception,
anti-choice, and pro-abstinence-only ideology, bolstered by medical
misinformation.

Every Woman's Concern

Much of the opposition to Keroack's appointment stems from his
previous role as medical director for A Woman's Concern (AWC), a
nonprofit group that runs six so-called "crisis pregnancy centers" in
Massachusetts.. Under Keroack's supervision, AWC health centers
would not distribute, encourage the use of, or offer referrals for
contraceptive drugs and devices. AWC states in its material
that "the crass commercialization and distribution of birth control
is demeaning to women, degrading of human sexuality and adverse to
human health and happiness."

The group not only opposes contraception and abortion, it goes one
step further — promoting misleading and deceptive reproductive health
information. AWC's materials incorrectly characterize traditional
forms of birth control as abortifacients, wrongly claim that the
distribution of contraception increases the number of pregnancies,
and distort research to make false claims about condoms and HIV. The
group also advances the myth that abortion increases a woman's risk
for breast cancer, despite scientific studies that have consistently
shown otherwise.

And despite their masquerade as family planning clinics, the
only "services" AWC "crisis pregnancy centers" provide are pregnancy
tests and ultrasounds administered for the sole purpose of
emotionally intimidating women into carrying unintended pregnancies
to term. This type of biased counseling flies in the face of the
Title X requirement that women facing an unintended pregnancy be
provided nondirective options counseling upon request — meaning
neutral, factual information on prenatal care and delivery; infant
care, foster care or adoption; and pregnancy termination.

Unexcused Abstinence

AWC is also the parent organization of Healthy Futures, the largest
faith-based abstinence-only program in Massachusetts, and the group
to which Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney awarded nearly $1 million in
federal funding to provide abstinence-only programs to the state's
public schools. Romney's decision earlier this year marked the first
time these federal abstinence-only funds were directed toward the
classroom in Massachusetts. (In previous years, those funds went
toward media campaigns.)

Keroack himself lectures far and wide on abstinence for organizations
like The Abstinence Clearinghouse. In his prepared talks, he has
compared premarital sex to "modern germ warfare" and, drawing from a
study on rodents, suggests that premarital sex diminishes a person's
ability to emotionally bond with future partners.

The Road Ahead

In his new role, Keroack will have primary influence over the type of
information and services disseminated to millions of women, men, and
teens in need of reliable reproductive health care. Many critics of
his appointment are deeply concerned that he may develop new
regulations for Title X clinics, set new priorities for the program
as a whole, and influence how federal money is spent, to the
detriment of the health of women and teens across the country.
Indeed, his appointment will most significantly affect the people who
are least able to access high-quality, scientifically sound, and
medically accurate reproductive health care — the poor and
uninsured.

This does not sit well with the more than two dozen leading
reproductive health care providers and advocates who have asked
Secretary Leavitt to pull Keroack's appointment, nor the 21
legislators who have called for the same, nor the more than 72,000
individuals who had signed Planned Parenthood's petition to replace
Keroack with a family planning advocate who is for family planning,
nor the countless editorial boards across the nation that have
seriously questioned Keroack's appointment. But the administration
has thus far stood by the appointment. Indeed, in response to
letters from members of both the House and Senate calling for
Keroack's appointment to be rescinded, a spokesperson for HHS
defended the appointment, saying that Keroack "has expressed to us
that he will fulfill his programmatic responsibilities in accordance
with the law, and we believe him." But Keroack has remained silent
on the matter, and his history does not give reason for optimism.

Planned Parenthood is sponsoring an online petition <linkto:
http://www.ppaction.org/campaign/keroackpetition2/> addressed to
Secretary Leavitt urging him to replace Dr. Keroack with an
administrator who is committed to protecting women's health. To
date, more than 72,000 people have added their names to the list. We
urge you to do the same.

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