Alaskan doctors disagree with Planned Parenthood clailms that abortions are ‘medically necessary’
Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys have filed a friend-of-the-court brief with the Alaska Supreme Court on behalf of physicians who support Senate Bill 49 and a related state regulation that clarify that Medicaid dollars can only be used to pay for “medically necessary” services as defined by medically recognized, statewide standards.
Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest is challenging the bill because the abortion giant wants taxpayers to fund virtually every abortion by claiming that all abortions are “medically necessary.”
“Alaska’s Medicaid funds should only be used to pay for necessary medical services, not elective abortions,” said ADF-allied attorney Kevin Clarkson, who co-wrote the brief for the Alaska physicians. “Planned Parenthood has routinely certified a medical necessity to exist simply because a woman doesn’t want to be pregnant—because of her employment or education, for example—or claims she doesn’t have the money to pay for an elective abortion. SB 49 protects taxpayers by providing clarity to the law so that any abortions paid for with Medicaid dollars truly are medically necessary.”
The brief filed in State of Alaska v. Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest clarifies the broader principle at stake: “As with all medical procedures, there is a proper and discernible distinction between procedures that are necessary to preserve a patient’s life and health and those that are undertaken voluntarily to achieve a speculative or subjectively desired result.”
The brief outlines that “the State is not obligated to leave the definition of ‘medical necessity’ for purposes of Medicaid funding in the sole and unquestioned discretion of the physician.” It goes on to demonstrate how Planned Parenthood’s standard of “medical necessity” is wildly subjective, creating troubling inconsistency in the use of public funds for pay for abortions.