Looking for a gift card for Christmas? Planned Parenthood has a novel idea: gift cards that you can use to pay for an abortion. Are you kidding me? I’m speechless.
From The Chicago Tribune below:
What do you get the person who has everything—except adequate health insurance? If you live in Indiana, consider this offering from the state's Planned Parenthood affiliate: gift certificates in $25 increments.
The vouchers, available online and at 35 clinics statewide, can be used for health services or contraceptives. And yes, they can be used to pay for abortions.
Betty Cockrum, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Indiana, characterizes the response to the gift certificates as "pretty robust, and generally very favorable."
She estimates that "about a dozen" certificates have sold since they became available Nov. 25. Planned Parenthood of Illinois plans to sell similar gift certificates starting Monday.
Click here to see Planned Parenthood’s pitch on these gift certificates or read it below:
Looking for an unusual, yet practical gift this holiday season? Planned Parenthood of Indiana (PPIN) is now offering gift certificates for services or the recipient’s choice of birth control method. The gift certificates can be purchased online in increments of $25 or for any amount at some of PPIN’s 35 health centers. Contact your local health center to see if they offer the certificates.
The gift certificates can be given to women and men to cover essential services like screenings and birth control. Services such as annual exams for women, which include breast exams and Pap tests, typically cost $58.
“Nearly 800,000 Hoosiers don’t have health insurance and can’t afford basic health services. Why not buy a loved one a gift this holiday season that they really need and one that will contribute to their health throughout the year?" asked PPIN President and CEO Betty Cockrum. “The gift certificates are also a wonderful idea for that person in your life who puts everyone else first and has been putting off taking care of her or his own health. Now, there’s no excuse for those people in your life not to get the basic health care that they need."
This is the first holiday season that PPIN has offered gift certificates. They can be redeemed at any of the 35 PPIN health centers around the state, no matter where they were purchased.
These gift certificates are not just for the uninsured people in your life. PPIN does take some forms of insurance and the gift certificates could be used for co-pays or medication. Please join Planned Parenthood of Indiana and give the gift of health this holiday season.
What’s next? Buy one get one free abortion deals? I’m not being funny. I’m being very serious. Oy, someone get me a chair. I need to sit down.
Politically, here's the question facing moderate Evangelicals who are looking to push the idea of common ground on abortion. If the goal is to reduce the amount of abortions in this country, do you feel a responsibility to speak out against these gift cards that give the impression of encouraging abortions? Should somebody, anybody from the moderate Evangelical community hold a press conference denouncing this idea? What about keeping the gift cards but not have them be valid for abortions?
Comments?