Planned Parenthood, serious about profit, not women’s health

It is all about abortion and the bottom line, says former PP clinic director

AUG. 23, 2012 – Profits take precedence over women’s health when it comes to Planned Parenthood’s focus, says a former employee of the abortion giant.

As the country finds itself in crosshairs of the “war on women,” a former Planned Parenthood employee, Susan Thayer, tells the real story of what goes on behind the closed doors of the “pro-women” clinics.

Thayer worked as a clinic director for Planned Parenthood in Iowa for 17 years before she joined the pro-life cause, only to see the very clinic she worked at close after the 40 Days For Life Campaign she initiated.

Q: Planned Parenthood markets itself as a health resource for women that provides, among other things, mammograms and other forms of cancer testing. Their website boasts of providing 750,000 breast exams annually, while abortion only makes up three percent of their work. The impression is that abortion is really just one of many things they do there. Is that impression accurate? 

Thayer: There has never been a mammogram done by any clinic in any affiliate. The only cancer screening done there are pap tests and there are fewer and fewer of those happening with the decline in clinician availability. 

They do offer a range of services – sexually transmitted infection testing/treatment, pregnancy testing, birth control, etc – but abortion is their “main event”. It’s what they do.

Q: How central is abortion to Planned Parenthood’s mission and bottom line? 

Thayer: When I started at Planned Parenthood in 1991, my small family planning clinic had little to do with abortion, other than an occasional referral. By the time I left in 2008, every clinic in the agency was mandated to provide webcam and/or surgical abortions. 

Every center had a goal for every service provided there, including abortion. As a manager, if your clinic did not meet goal, you better have a reason why. Webcam abortions are billed the same as early surgical abortions, so they are huge money- makers for the abortion giant.

Every affiliate places huge emphasis on abortion. The staff is groomed, brainwashed actually, to fully believe that working in the abortion industry is an honorable task. They have “pastors” who write letters to the staff to make them feel good about their own part in abortion. 

When you are in it, it is very subtle. But like a cult, once you are out, it is much easier to see the deception.

Q: There was a lot of uproar recently with the Susan G. Komen Foundation’s effort to stop giving grant money to Planned Parenthood for breast cancer screening. How does Planned Parenthood justify receiving these grants when it doesn’t do mammograms? What happens to the money? 

Thayer: The money goes into the big black hole that is Planned Parenthood.

Cecile Richards actually said that if Planned Parenthood lost the Komen grants, women would not be diagnosed. This is a complete and total lie. The only breast care done at Planned Parenthood is a manual exam done only during a comprehensive visit. Most patients have only a limited exam, or no exam at all and just get birth control.  Planned Parenthood once again played the victim and turned the Komen situation into a very successful fundraiser.

 Q: Why do you think Planned Parenthood gets away with representing itself so falsely?

Thayer: They are big and they have friends in high places. When I started there, the mission statement was posted in every clinic, but over time, their emphasis came off the mission and focused only on the bottom line. Margaret Sanger founded the organization on eugenics, so even at its roots it is evil. 

There is a video called “Hooking Kids on Sex” which really gives a candid view of Planned Parenthood and the type of events they host. They are experts at selling their agenda. 

Their constant message has been that only three percent of their services involve abortion,” but the reality is they do not care about women, only their own growth. To Planned Parenthood, abortion truly is only a number, a weekly goal.


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About Carrie Gress, Ph.D. 54 Articles
Carrie Gress has a doctorate in philosophy from the Catholic University of America. She is the editor at the Catholic Women's online magazine Theology of Home. She is the author of several books including The Anti-Mary Exposed, Theology of Home, and . Theology of Home II: The Spiritual Art of Homemaking. Visit her online at CarrieGress.com.