FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 14, 2021
Mary Alice Carter, mary.alice@conwaystrategic.com
HHS Announces A Move to End Harmful Title X Restrictions Put in Place Under Trump
Organizations that also mention abortion should once again be part of the program
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced that they would move to once again allow health centers that provide or refer for abortion to participate in Title X, the nation’s birth control and sexual health program. The Trump administration had drastically altered the program which resulted in low-income people being unable to access birth control from health centers that provided their patients with information on a full range of quality healthcare, including abortion referrals.
“Today, HHS is moving to right one of the most egregious health care wrongs of the past administration. The ‘gag rule’ that denied health care clinics funding if they so much as mentioned abortion was engineered to put providers in an impossible position — forcing them to choose between being able to provide patients with affordable care or giving their patients full information. The rule disproportionately harmed the low-income communities the Title X program is designed to serve, and it never should have happened.” said Molly Bangs, Director, Equity Forward.
Eliminating the Title X gag rule and restoring the program is part of Equity Forward’s comprehensive series of policy recommendations — developed both internally and in numerous diverse coalitions.
Additionally, Equity Forward has tracked the political attacks on this program from the outset of the Trump administration here.
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Equity Forward is a watchdog project that seeks to ensure transparency and accountability among anti-reproductive health groups and individuals who are actively working to deny people access to services such as birth control and abortion.