Wisconsin Republican bill would eliminate abortion training, worsen shortage of doctors

Rep. André Jacque

Wisconsin is facing a critical shortage of obstetricians/gynecologists, with 20 of the state’s 72 counties lacking even one. And now, a Planned-Parenthood-hating legislator is doing his best to make everything even worse:

A Republican bill that would block University of Wisconsin-Madison faculty from training resident physicians in abortions would worsen a shortage of obstetrics/gynecological providers in the state, school officials say.

UW-Madison must provide abortion training to maintain its national accreditation for OB-GYN training, Robert Golden, dean of the university’s medical school, said. Without that accreditation, would-be OB-GYNs would find residencies in other states, he said.

[…]

The UW School of Medicine and Public Health, Aurora Health Care and the Medical College of Wisconsin all train OB-GYN residents in how to perform abortions. Wisconsin law blocks spending public dollars on elective abortions, so the UW-Madison medical school has an agreement with Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin in which that organization pays UW physicians to perform abortions and train OB-GYN residents in how to perform abortions at its Madison clinic.

[Rep. André] Jacque’s bill, introduced in April, would prohibit UW-Madison employees from performing abortions as well as training others or receiving training in performing abortions anywhere other than a hospital. Since the training requires participating in abortions and government dollars can’t be used to facilitate abortions, the training can’t take place at the university hospital. That would leave nowhere for UW-Madison residents to obtain it. They would have to join another residency program if they wanted to become a certified OB-GYN.

Not only would OB-GYN residents look elsewhere, faculty instructors also would likely leave the state to join accredited programs, Golden said.

[…]

In a memo seeking co-sponsors for the bill, Jacque, one of the staunchest social conservatives in the Assembly, wrote that the legislation would end the “appalling arrangement” in which Planned Parenthood purchases UW faculty’s time to perform abortions.

To recap: The university would likely lose its OB-GYN accreditation, hospitals could no longer offer training through Planned Parenthood, medical students wouldn’t receive the training they need and would have to go out-of-state, and overall there’d be fewer OB-GYNs around – all this in a state where women are already struggling to find specialized doctors.

But the upshot is a socially regressive lawmaker might get to stick it to Planned Parenthood, kind of, in a pointlessly jerkish move that would hurt everyone else (especially women). He’d probably consider that a victory.

(via Friendly Atheist)