May. 10, 2017
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| At a press conference at the state Capitol, Rep. Judy Ward (R-Blair) unveiled legislation she is authoring to reprioritize the allocation of public funds for family planning purposes and women’s health. Her bill would be the companion legislation to Sen. John Eichelberger’s Senate Bill 300. |
HARRISBURG – At a press conference today at the state Capitol, Rep. Judy Ward (R-Blair) unveiled legislation she is authoring to reprioritize the allocation of public funds for family planning purposes and women’s health. Her bill would be the companion legislation to Sen. John Eichelberger’s (R-Blair)
Senate Bill 300.
“It is time to put an emphasis on women’s health care and make sure public funds are spread out to those facilities that are in the best possible position to provide women with convenient, comprehensive health care,” said Ward. “Currently, here in Blair County, women are limited in locations they can go to retain services due to the lack of funding for women’s health care dedicated to places such as Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHC). My legislation will change the current distribution of funds so these facilities have fair access to funding.”
Additional comments from Ward can be viewed here.
Specifically, Ward’s legislation, which is being co-sponsored by Rep. Paul Schemel (R-Franklin), would provide direction to the Pennsylvania Department of Health as to how it must prioritize the allocation of public funds for family planning purposes. Effectively, this legislation would favor more conventional health care providers over unconventional providers when allocating public funds for women’s health.
Currently, limited federal and state public funding exists for family planning and preventative health services for women. To ensure maximized use of funding, this legislation would prioritize the distribution to the most efficient point-of-service health care providers and encourage complete medical records for all services provided to women.
“Under our proposal, public entities would receive the highest priority for receiving such funds, followed by non-public hospitals and federally qualified health centers, rural health clinics and non-public health providers that have their primary purpose as the provision of primary health care,” said Ward. “Women’s health services are considered primary health care and such services should be encouraged to be provided by those health care professionals who participate in electronic health records and integrated health systems.
“The point is that several million dollars each year is being allocated to Planned Parenthood under the auspices of women’s health care; however, there are no Planned Parenthood facilities in Blair County. This means there is no public funding coming to the rural women in my area who are in need of services such as family planning, mammograms and other services. We do have several FQHCs, but they are not receiving the money to provide these services at the levels needed,” said Ward. “This is about directing tax dollars to the institutions that are in the best position to offer services to those in need, which means we need to reprioritize our current funding distribution strategy.”
Ward and Schemel plan to formally introduce their legislation in the House of Representatives in the near future.
Representative Judy Ward
80th Legislative District
Pennsylvania House of Representatives
Media Contact: Tricia Lehman
717.772.9840
tlehman@pahousegop.com
RepJudyWard.com /
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