Who Put Failed Abstinence-Only Programs Back in Health Care Reform? And Why?

Lost in the shuffle of analysis of the new health care reform legislation is the fact that Democrats included over $250 million for failed Title V abstinence-only-until-marriage programs. The funds had been inserted in the health care reform legislation by Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) during Senate Finance Committee consideration of the bill last summer and, somehow, quietly survived the process of revisions that went on last fall.

Never mind that these programs place the health and lives of young people at risk by denying them medically accurate information about condoms and birth control. Never mind that an exhaustive eight-year evaluation by Mathematica published in April, 2007 showed that these programs have “no impact on teen behavior.”

Never mind that 22 states had rejected Title V funding in the past because they did not want to spend precious matching funds on programs that don’t work. Never mind that Speaker Pelosi condemned these programs at the Netroots conference in 2008. Bottom line is they are back, and Democrats seem none to eager to own up to who threw young people under the bus!

Here are some of the things we are hearing. Even though a number of prominent Democrats including Cong. Henry Waxman (D-CA) had contacted leadership and demanded that the ab-only programs be pulled from the bill, we’ve been told that leadership was focused on the "bigger issues" and never reached consideration of the ab-only piece.

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/04/01-3

"Hatch pushes abstinence only in health reform

By Matt Canham

The Salt Lake Tribune
Updated: 09/29/2009 09:31:35 PM MDT

Washington » A Senate committee voted late Tuesday to bring back federally sponsored abstinence-only education, tucking $50 million a year into the broader health reform package.

The Senate Finance Committee narrowly approved the amendment offered by Utah GOP Sen. Orrin Hatch on a 12 to 11 vote with Democratic Sens. Kent Conrad, N.D., and Blanche Lincoln, Ark., siding with the panel's 10 Republicans.

The amendment was approved over the objections of the committee's chairman, Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., who offered his own amendment that would create a program that would teach about abstinence, contraceptives and life skills, such as financial literacy.

Baucus's amendment -- with a price tag of $50 million annually -- also was approved by the committee.

Hatch and Baucus argued about the effectiveness of abstinence-only education programs, continuing a debate between the two parties that has gone on for years -- and because of the dueling votes will continue as part of the health reform debate. The amendments would still need to go before the full Senate and House.

President Barack Obama's budget calls for a comprehensive sex education program similar to that offered by Baucus, while phasing out the abstinence-only program vigorously supported by his predecessor, former President George W. Bush. "

http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_13449319

From what I've read since, the Baucus amendment funding was increased to $75 million. The Hatch amendment had Democratic support and apparently they could not strip it from the Bill.

Half of what these programs used to get under Bush.