During the summit, we were able to meet with several legislative staff members on Capitol Hill, including both Senators Graham and DeMint. (We were tweeting while in the Capitol Building- thanks to all those who tweeted back messages of support!) We brought numerous fact sheets and reference materials, including our new report Do You Know What You’re Spending on Teen Pregnancy?: A Report on the Public Cost of Teen Pregnancy in South Carolina. The staff members asked a lot of insightful questions and agreed that the number of teen pregnancies in South Carolina is far too high.

Lobbying alongside us was Shannon Flynn, Director of Research and Evaluation at the South Carolina Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy. Shannon brought her encyclopedic knowledge of teen birth rates and statistics with her, which helped support our overall messages and illustrated a need for more work to be done. (We also had a fantastic lunch of Ethiopian food – Shannon’s suggestion!)

All in all, the trip to the State Summit was a wonderful opportunity to meet with fellow advocates from across the country on how to bring better sex education to our state. The fight to make sex education a reality in all states is still far from over but with insightful ideas and new ways of thinking, we are closer to bringing responsible reproductive health education and policies to South Carolina.

Thank you to all those who attended and especially to the organizations who held this extraordinary conference.

One of the major spending cuts proposed in the federal budget fight was over funding for Planned Parenthood. The contentious arguments that followed, and ultimately ended with 5% cut for all family planning services in the United States, ranged from level-headed and rational to absurd and ridiculous.

Planned Parenthood and other prevention-based family planning providers, is a necessary service in this country. Planned Parenthood provides pap smears, birth control, and other prevention-based health care for women across the country, 75% of which are low-income women and families. In 2009, they helped prevent over 600,000 unintended pregnancies.*

Demonizing facilities that are designed to improve women’s health is a scare tactic- and more over, it is a sexist scare tactic. Women are being victimized and used in this political game, and we’re losing.

H. 3408- the Healthcare Freedom of Conscience Act, has been passed though the South Carolina House. Part of the budget deal struck on Friday included a promise to separate votes on removing funding from Planned Parenthood and striping even more funds from family planning. The budget deal also cut $600 million in funding to community health centers and a $260 million cut to the National Institutes for Health. When did women’s health get put on the table as something open for negotiation?

Want to “do something” about this? Click here to take action and send a message to your elected officials. Make them see that women’s health isn’t up for negotiation!

*Planned Parenthood Federation of America: Fact Sheet

Tell Them is very proud to present Dr. Lilly Filler of Columbia, South Carolina. Dr. Filler is the founder and a practicing member of Women Physicians Associates, Ob/Gyn in Columbia. She is a Past President of the Columbia Medical Society, a Former Chief of Staff of Palmetto Richland Hospital. Dr. Filler is also a former Board Member of Planned Parenthood in Columbia. Watch as she speaks about the importance of accepting the medical reality of the situation (above) and as she invites you to join the Virtual March (below).