The President's FY2009 budget proposes cutting Medicaid funding for family planning by $570 million in (fiscal year) FY2009 and by $3.3 billion over five years.  This would have a devastating effect on the millions of low-income women who rely on Medicaid for contraception and other preventive family planning services.  The President's drastic proposal would do nothing more than increase the number of unintended pregnancies and the rate of sexually transmitted infections (STI's), including HIV/AIDS.    

In addition, the President's budget proposes to flat-fund America's family planning program, despite the fact that Title X is drastically underfunded.  Seventeen million women need publicly funded family planning services.  Funding for Title X family planning should be increased by $100 million in FY2009 to begin to fill this gap and meet the needs of the millions of women who need access to family planning services.

In another example of the backward budget, the President wants to cut the overall budget, but insists on increasing funding for ineffective abstinence-only sex education programs by $27.7 million, a 24% increase!  A recent congressional study on abstinence-only programs found they had no measurable impact on increasing abstinence or delaying sexual initiation.  To read the study, visit http://www.mathematica-mpr.com/publications/PDFs/impactabstinence.pdf.

Also, for the first time in 14 years, the teen birth rate has risen.  In the last spending bill, Congress sent the President a strong message by providing no new funding for dangerous abstinence-only programs.  Yet, the President continues to fail our teens by refusing to fund comprehensive sex education while stubbornly increasing funding for dangerous programs that don't work.