Listen to this article

The administration of Donald Trump has backed one of its severest attacks on abortion. The campaigners have warned the election and clinics which offer the procedure could be forced to close. The warning from the service providers came after the U.S appeals court backed maintained rules which impose barriers for women who want abortions. The federal grant program, Title X program subsidizes affordable birth control, cancer screenings, HIV screening and other medical care for four million low-income patients. The rules will bar clinics getting federal money from sharing office space with abortion providers from 4^th March 2020. The campaigners and service providers said it will likely force abortion clinics to relocate or shut their doors entirely.

A lawyer for the Campaign for Accountability (a public interest watchdog based in the U.S), Alice Huling said the rule will change initially introduced March 2019 law of the U.S Department of Health and Human Services. She informed a news outlet and said, “It is one of the Trump administration’s biggest attacks on the right to have an abortion and the provision of comprehensive healthcare. It is part of an effort to wage war on women’s sexual and reproductive freedom. It is certainly the biggest effort the Trump administration has made to defund Planned Parenthood and to redirect family planning funding to other organizations, some of which give women dangerous, misleading, and incomplete healthcare”.

It is noteworthy that Planned Parenthood sued the Trump administration in March in an attempt to block the rule which makes it illegal for all services in the Title X program to tell people how they can get an abortion. The majority of Title X patients are people of color, Hispanic, or Latino. Some major medical associations, like the American Medical Association, the American College of Physicians, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists have opposed the move. The acting president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Alexis McGill Johnson said, “Your access to health care should not depend on how much you earn, where you live, or who you are. The Trump administration’s dangerous gag rule is causing immense harm across the country”.