Thursday, July 7, 2011

The perks of being an intern...

A lot is happening in the world of Planned Parenthood, and I could not be more excited to be a part of it. Somehow, throughout the continued attempts to restrict women’s health care, PPFA rallies at the last minute to ensure that essential services are preserved. Last week, in the midst of the attempted shutdown of abortion clinics in Kansas, we actually got to meet and have lunch with the amazing staff attorneys involved in “impact legislation” for Planned Parenthood. These are the women joining the doctors and nurses administering care on the front lines, filing lawsuits on behalf of Planned Parenthood and their clients every time a state legislature passes a law that may be unconstitutional. We also got a sneak peek behind the scenes at the Kansas fight and the kinds of “licensing requirements” with which the clinics were supposed to comply—which were indicative of the state legislature’s political stance against Planned Parenthood, rather than licensing concerns (more about that in the HuffPo article linked to above).

For now, at least, women of Kansas and mid-Missouri will be able to continue to access services. For me, these intern lunches present an amazing opportunity to hear from women who have spent their lives defending not just a woman’s right to choose, but a woman’s ability to access affordable health care.

And yesterday? We met and spoke with Cecile Richards. It was AMAZING. More on that...and what I'm actually doing in a later post!

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