Texas lawmakers in 2011, engaged in what one right-wing legislator openly called a “war on birth control,” cut $73 million from family planning services for poor and uninsured women. What are the consequences of that foolishness? From the Texas Tribune:
“The latest Health and Human Services Commission projections being circulated among Texas lawmakers indicate that during the 2014-15 biennium poor women will deliver an estimated 23,760 more babies than they would have as a result of their reduced access to state-subsidized birth control. The additional cost to taxpayers is expected to be as much as $273 million — $103 million to $108 million to the state’s general revenue budget alone — and the bulk of it is the cost of caring for those infants under Medicaid.”
That’s what happens when right-wing ideologues — like Texas Gov. Rick Perry — play politics with women’s health care.
