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August 06, 2015 02:10 PM UTC

Terrible Anti-IUD Press Silences Colorado Senate GOP

  • 9 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

iudA major battle this past legislative session over state funding for a highly successful program to provide long-acting reversible contraception (LARC), generally in the form of an intra-uterine device (IUD), continues to generate bad press for the one-seat Republican majority in the Colorado Senate responsible for killing legislation to keep the program going. There was some confusion in the immediate aftermath of that decision as to whether or not the program, which was started with private seed grant money, would continue without tax dollars–or if continued, whether services would be impacted.

As the Denver Post’s John Frank reported early this week, there have indeed been consequences for women’s health:

Over the past seven years, a private foundation donated about $27 million to boost the program, but the grant money expired July 1.

A push to use state taxpayer dollars to continue the program failed in the Republican-led state Senate earlier this year, killed by ideological and fiscal objections.

Now, a month after the money ceased, the county clinics that administer the program are starting to see the effects, as limited federal and state funding fail to meet high demand in some areas…

In Jefferson County, the state’s fourth largest, the public health department had to start a waiting list in July.

In Pueblo County, the clinics are reserving the high-end devices for clients under age 19 and those with Medicaid coverage, which will reimburse the cost.

According to Larry Wolk, director of the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, the hunt continues for private funds to carry the program for another year, and he hopes it will come through in the next few weeks–which would allow clinics now forced to delay access to IUDs to resume at full steam. In response to GOP critics who say that private funds should continue to pay in full, LARC backers say that was never the purpose of the startup grants that funded the program up to now. Because the reduction in unintended pregnancies saves the state of Colorado considerable amounts of money, the state should pick up the cost for the LARC program to allow private grant dollars to flow to communities that don’t yet have this positive experience to motivate them.

In the months since the end of this year’s legislative session, the story of Colorado’s successful IUD program–and the inexplicable killing of legislation to fund it by the state Senate GOP majority–has been retold by news outlets across the nation. At one point in the after-debate, Senate Republicans fielded defenders like Sen. Ellen Roberts to try to explain why these funds were voted down. That didn’t go over very well to put it mildly, and in recent weeks, we’ve seen almost nothing in the way of comment from Republicans about the LARC program.

At this point, we have to think that no one is more eager to see CDPHE pull down private grant money to keep this program alive until the next legislative session than Senate Republicans. Repeated news stories documenting this program’s success, always with a word about the GOP killing the funds over “ideological and fiscal objections,” are very bad for this one-seat Senate Republican majority headed into a presidential election year. With Roberts already kneecapped out of the U.S. Senate race in part by her bumbling responses to this question, quantifiable damage has already been done.

And short of a huge about-face we don’t see coming, there will be more damage done by November of 2016.

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9 thoughts on “Terrible Anti-IUD Press Silences Colorado Senate GOP”

  1. The whole reason the Buffet family funded this experiment is as a proof of concept.  They done proved it.  Now it's time for Republicans to step up, stop the insanity of their "IUDs cause abortion" nonsense and stop some actual goddam abortions.

    I hope that their God takes out of their eternal souls the weight of every terminated pregnancy that results from their craven idiocy.

    1. As noted elsewhere, the fight against Planned Parenthood is really a fight against contraception. Planned Parenthood – and almost every pro-choice person and group out there – has always believed that reducing unwanted pregnancies is the single best way to reduce abortions. And it's true; by far contraception has been the single largest factor in reduced abortions across this country since they were introduced.

      Yet another area where Republicans aren't being the responsible party, not looking out for sustainability or family finances or even family stability. Just punishment for having the misfortune of being female and getting pregnant against your will, or with complications that might kill you.

  2. Phoenix: “as noted elsewhere, the fight against Planned Parenthood is really a fight against contraception……."

    The far right religious groups, plus the hierarchy of the Catholic Church, are unable to get Roe v. Wade and Griswold v. Connecticut overturned. So, they work to limit the impact of these SCOTUS decisions. Note the focus on junk science to limit abortions and close clinics, like requiring clinic doctors to have admitting privileges at local hospitals, requiring clinic hallways to be a certain width, requiring women to undergo unnecessary and unwanted medical procedures (ultrasounds), requiring a woman to be "briefed" on what she intends to abort, requiring unnecessary waiting periods before having the abortion, etc. and etc. (as if virtually all women seeking an abortion haven't already thought things through). 

    The attack on contraception includes IUDs. In the past legislative session, Senator Kevin Lundberg was quoted saying that IUDs are aborti-facients. Of course, the American College of Obstetricians & Gynecologists says different. But these far right wing politicians can't let a little real science interfere with their religious beliefs that they want to impose on others. Several of these groups (American Life League, Americans United for Life) question the pill. No word yet how they feel about truck stop condom machines.

    Don't believe me?  Visit  thepillkills.org.  

    2. But it's not the far right of the Republican party, CHB. It's more than main stream. It's an absolute requirement for being nominated and elected as a Republican any more. Republican pols have to toe the line on these anti-birth control/anti-choice views to get anywhere.  Every Republican majority legislative body pours its priority energy into legislation in support of these anti-birth control/anti-choice views. Your views are the ones that are far out there in relation to those that are absolutely required of Republican candidates and elected officials at every level. No Republican available for you to vote for is going to support your views on these issues.  Heck, they can't even raise their hands to say they accept the science of evolution and have a prayer in a primary. 

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