Wisconsin Watch Media Partners Center (https://partners.wisconsinwatch.org/tag/planned-parenthood/)
The 32 legislators’ action was prompted by a Center story in November about state auditors alleging that two family planning clinics overbilled Medicaid by $3.5 million, largely for birth control drugs and devices. Family planning providers say the auditors’ stance could force many clinics to close, while the state maintains it is protecting taxpayers.
Two family planning clinics serving low-income women say their operations will be at serious financial risk if state auditors stand firm on claims that they overbilled Medicaid by $3.5 million, largely for birth control drugs and devices.
“My hunch is that if any one of us were audited it would come out the same way. We’re all operating the same way,” said Beth Hartung, president of the Wisconsin Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association. “It would mean, quite frankly, that we would all close.”
Despite an overall decline in abortions by Wisconsin women in 2012, the number of surgical abortions rose by 8 percent last year — the first increase since the state started tracking abortion methods in 1998, records show.
Planned Parenthood has not provided abortions by medication since April, claiming a new abortion law’s language was too vague to comply with. As a result, many women have had surgical abortions instead and face delays in making appointments.
Medication abortions have become more prevalent nationally in the past few years, and laws targeting them are sweeping state legislatures across the country.