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Planned Parenthood defense unfounded, CMP says
Diana Chandler, Baptist Press
July 16, 2015
5 MIN READ TIME

Planned Parenthood defense unfounded, CMP says

Planned Parenthood defense unfounded, CMP says
Diana Chandler, Baptist Press
July 16, 2015

Planned Parenthood is lying in defense of its dispensation of aborted fetal parts through its nearly 70 U.S. clinics, said a nonprofit medical watchdog group that has conducted an undercover investigation of the abortion provider.

The Center for Medical Progress (CMP) released video footage July 14 of a Planned Parenthood executive meeting with a CMP investigator who posed as a fetal parts buyer, in which the costs, procedures and regulations in the procurement and transportation of a wide range of fetal parts were discussed.

In its defense, Planned Parenthood said it “donates” fetal tissue for scientific research “with full, appropriate consent from patients and under the highest ethical and legal standards,” and that “there is no financial benefit for tissue donation for either the patient or for Planned Parenthood.”

Planned Parenthood’s claims of gaining patient consent, not receiving monetary profit and following the law in its dispensation of aborted fetal tissue are all false, CMP said within hours of Planned Parenthood’s statement.

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“Planned Parenthood makes two key admissions in their statement today: 1) aborted fetal parts are harvested at their clinics, and 2) money is exchanged in connection with this. They also tell several lies: 1) That proper consent is obtained from patients, 2) That Planned Parenthood does not make money off the body parts, and 3) That everything is legal,” CMP said in a press release posted at centerformedicalprogress.org.

“None of this is standard across the mainstream medical field,” CMP said, “but it is standard across Planned Parenthood’s insular and unaccountable abortion field.”

But Planned Parenthood, in an official statement July 15, maintained its propriety in the face of growing allegations from political leaders and others.

“These outrageous claims are flat-out untrue, but that doesn’t matter to politicians with a longstanding political agenda to ban abortion and defund Planned Parenthood,” Planned Parenthood Vice President of Communications Eric Ferrero said. “Women and families who make the decision to donate fetal tissue for lifesaving scientific research should be honored, not attacked and demeaned.

“Our medical practices and guidelines in this area are clear, and we do this important work just like other high-quality health care providers,” Ferrero said, “with full, appropriate consent from patients, under the highest ethical and legal standards, and with no financial benefit for the patient or Planned Parenthood.”

Russell Moore, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, said Planned Parenthood’s practice is indefensible.

“The horror of this story should be shocking to the consciences of all Americans. And Planned Parenthood’s response to this video is as chilling as it is unconvincing,” Moore said in a July 15 press release. “Let’s be clear about what is going on. It is not only that infants, in their mother’s wombs, are deprived of their lives, but also that their corpses are desecrated for profit. This is not only murderous; it is murderous in the most ghoulish way imaginable.

“Is it not clear at this point that these are not health care providers but pirates and grave-robbers of those who have no graves?” Moore said. “The Department of Justice and the United States Congress should undertake a thorough investigation of this.”

CMP posted on its website a link to an advertisement from StemExpress, LLC, that promotes doing business with the California-based biomedical company as financially profitable. StemExpress supplies human cells, fluids, blood and tissue parts to research laboratories.

“[StemExpress] advertises four different times the financial benefit that Planned Parenthood clinics can receive from supplying fetal tissue, with the words: ‘financially profitable,’ ‘financial profits,’ ‘financial benefit to your clinic,’ [and] ‘fiscal growth of your own clinic,’“ CMP said. “The advertisement carries an endorsement from [Mar Monte] Planned Parenthood Medical Director Dr. Dorothy Furgerson.”

The advertisement quotes Furgerson, who directs clinics in middle California and northern Nevada, as saying, “Our partnership with StemExpress is beneficial in a number of ways. First, it allows us to contribute to life-saving research that is advancing diagnostic and medical care. Second, StemExpress has a Plug-in Solution that allows us to add additional clinics quickly. Lastly, I feel confident that our patients’ anonymity is secure through their strict protocols and practices.”

Planned Parenthood in a July 14 press release described CMP as “a well-funded group established for the purpose of damaging Planned Parenthood’s mission and service.”

U.S. House Speaker John Boehner released a statement July 15 calling for an investigation into Planned Parenthood’s practices.

“I have asked our relevant committees to look into this matter. I am also calling on President Obama and Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell to denounce, and stop, these gruesome practices,” Boehner said. “When an organization monetizes an unborn child – and with the cavalier attitude portrayed in this horrific video – we must all act.”

Moore requested an investigation of Planned Parenthood in letters to Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell July 14, and has encouraged continued efforts to prohibit the use of taxpayer dollars in funding abortions.

“If we have learned anything from the Kermit Gosnell horrors of years past,” Moore wrote, “surely we have learned that vulnerable women and children should be protected from this sort of abusive profiteering.”

In his press release, Moore also called on presidential candidates to address the atrocities shown in the undercover video.

In related news, the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee as well as the states of Texas and Louisiana have launched investigations of Planned Parenthood, the Washington Post reported.

(EDITOR’S NOTE – Diana Chandler is Baptist Press’ general assignment writer/editor.)

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