Planned Parenthood provides needed care

Planned Parenthood provides needed care
EDITOR:
As a former member of the board of Planned Parenthood of Mahoning Valley, I was dismayed to learn that while our state representatives are currently planning the new Ohio budget for 2002-2003, ultra-conservative organizations are lobbying to "defund Planned Parenthood."
Family planning funds come to Planned Parenthood affiliates from the Ohio Department of Health, which channels to them federal Title X money along with a smaller "matching fund," $1.7 million from the state budget.
The state dollars received by Planned Parenthood are used strictly to fund health care and family planning services to women who are poor, most of whom work for low wages and are either uninsured or underinsured. State law prohibits use of state funds for abortion services or for referral for abortions.
The 10 Planned Parenthood organizations in Ohio provide for almost two-thirds of the 132,000 women served statewide. Locally, services to 1,300 of the approximately 6,200 women served by Planned Parenthood of Mahoning Valley, Inc. would be curtailed if the $95,000 in state funding now received annually were cut.
Many of the women who visit Planned Parenthood clinics can't afford the care of a private physician. Some 820 area women are treated at no charge at all because they are at 100 percent of the poverty level. Those women depend on Planned Parenthood for life-saving cervical cancer screenings and breast exams as well as for contraceptives to prevent unintended pregnancies.
Our community has been making a real effort to get women with children off welfare and into the work force, but those women are struggling just to get by and care for their families with low wages and no benefits.
If Planned Parenthood were "defunded," these women could be faced with the loss of vital health care and more unintended pregnancies, 40 percent of which end in abortion. This would defeat the purpose of our efforts to reduce the number of abortions, which have been declining.
I certainly wish the people who support Planned Parenthood would be as vocal as its opponents.
JUDITH STANGER
Boardman
Bunny a pagan symbol
EDITOR:
America prides itself as being a Christian nation, but unknowingly some of our customs have a pagan origin -- one is the Easter bunny.
The name Easter derives from the ancient Northern European pagan fertility goddess Eastre. The ancient word eastre means "spring." This goddess had as her earthly symbol the prolific hare, or rabbit.
Hence the origin of the Easter bunny.
So when our Christian society promotes the Easter bunny we are not promoting a Christ-like custom, but one related to the fertility goddess Eastre.
ANNE PALIK
Youngstown
In stores, markets, a little patience goes a long way
EDITOR:
This is a fast-moving world. As we age, we realize that moving fast is not always a good thing. Where are we rushing to anyway?
It's impossible to have a check-out line for each person's needs: the person who writes out the check for their purchases, the person who wants to give the cashier the exact amount of the purchase even if it means looking for that misplaced change purse. The person who is helping another person shop and has to run from the cashier to the disabled purchaser to have a check signed. For the cashier and second-in-line purchaser to practice patience and tolerance toward the people in front of us, is a good thing.
We are all good people and wonderfully different. We just need to slow down some.
SANDRA MOCK
Youngstown