Lawsuit vs Kansas includes Planned Parenthood midwives
Just days ago, Planned Parenthood filed suit in federal court to stop Kansas from barring them as Medicaid providers following an executive order by Gov. Sam Brownback to the state health department.
This issue is similar to, but different from, the lawsuit Planned Parenthood lost in 2014 to regain Kansas funding as federal Title X providers. The latter– Title X prioritization of full-service public clinics and hospitals –was put permanently into statute last week in the waning days of the Kansas legislative session.
The plaintiffs of the new lawsuit included three Medicaid-eligible women, two distinct Planned Parenthood entities (the Kansas &Mid- Missouri business and the St. Louis Missouri business) and—wait for it– two midwives who were on staffuntil recently.
Yes, midwives.
Midwives Victoria Zadoyan and Justine Flory (currently employed in Topeka and Lawrence according to online information) were described in the lawsuit asworking at Planned Parenthood of Kansas & Mid-Missouri up until a year or so ago. The lawsuit makes a ridiculous claim that those two midwives’ reputations will be harmed if their Planned Parenthood Medicaid identification numbers are associated with state disqualification for Medicaid provision—even though neither is currently employed by Planned Parenthood.
These midwives should be more worried about how their “reputation” is sullied by their work for Planned Parenthood and their willingness to sue Kansas on behalf of the abortion giant.
PPKMM past midwives Flory & Zadoyan
While pro-life readers may be shocked to learn that midwives who espouse a natural childbirth experience could work at abortion clinics, I am not.
I first personally encountered the concept that midwives could be pro-abortion 24 years ago. This was when I was one of a group of pro-life moms doing volunteer counseling outside a Topeka abortion clinic (no longer in operation). We had made a “save,” i.e. had successfully convinced a pregnant woman (call her Jane) not to choose abortion. We helped Jane with her needs until she delivered and held the baby shower for her at my home.
It was at this occasion when Jane shared with us that after we had first dissuaded her from abortion and sent her to medical assistance in town, the nurse there had tried to push her back into choosing abortion. More shocking and horrifying to me was that the “nurse” she named was the midwife who attended one of my children’s births!
The abortion industry has long been pushing to have “mid-level” providers supplant the ever-decreasing number of physician abortionists.
In 1990 a symposium held by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the National Abortion Federation recommended nurse-midwives be trained to perform first-trimester legal abortions under physician supervision. One-half of the nurse-midwives who were members of the American College of Nurse-Midwives were polled, and 1,208 questionnaires (71.1%) were returned with these results:
- 79% opposed federal and state efforts to limit access to abortion;
- 91% would be willing to refer for abortion;
- 52% would vote in a secret ballot to permit the performance of abortion by certified nurse-midwives;
- 57% would be willing to prescribe RU 486;
- 24% would, or possibly would, incorporate abortion procedures into their practice; and
- 19% would, or possibly would, perform abortions in an abortion clinic.
That was over 25 years ago and yet some legislators were shocked when Kansans for Life insisted during the closing days of session that new regulations for the independent practice of midwives include a ban on abortion. The ban was passed.
The “scope of practice” of midwives is intentionally written so broadly that it could be interpreted to include abortion, or it could specifically include abortion.
Adding to that, leading medical groups have been cheer leading their provision of abortion since 1994, including the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, American Academy of Physician Assistants, the American College of Nurse-Midwives, the National Association of Nurse Practitioners in Women’s Health, and the International Confederation of Midwives.
Kansas legislators have successfully shut the door on more abortions by midwives and the latest Planned Parenthood lawsuit shows they were correct to do so.