Your Odds Of An Unplanned Pregnancy Will Spike With New GOP Health Care Bill

The GOP's newly introduced health care plan would lead to thousands of additional births, according to an estimate made by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.

The CBO is a government group that analyzes budgets. It's nonpartisan, which means it's neither Republican nor Democratic. The CBO analyzed the Republican's health care plan, which they want to replace the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare).

The Republicans in the House of Representatives, led by Paul Ryan, came up the American Health Care Act. The CBO analyzed it in a report released on March 13.

The analysis was... not great.

Overall, it estimated, 14 million people would lose health insurance in 2018 with this plan. That number will rise to 24 million by 2026.

The GOP plan would do a lot of things to health insurance. One big part of the plan is to take away federal funding for Planned Parenthood for one year.

Federal funding does not go to abortion, so federal funding to Planned Parenthood instead goes to things like birth control, IUDs and implants, condoms and sexual health education.

And what do those things do? Prevent unwanted pregnancies!

So the CBO checked out this GOP plan and was like "lol wow this is bad."

Planned Parenthood serves a lot of women, and particularly low-income women without more access to health care. According to the CBO, 15 percent of women in areas without access to health care for low income people will lose access to care.

Without access to contraceptives, women will get pregnant, so there will be more unwanted pregnancies and births.

In fact, the CBO predicts there will be thousands more births.

And the interesting thing about births is that they are expensive!

In fact, the CBO estimates, those several thousand births (from just one year without Planned Parenthood funding) will increase federal spending for Medicaid by $21 million in 2017 and $77 million from 2017 to 2026.

Even more interesting thing about expensive births is that they lead to babies, and babies also cost money!

So there's this whole expanding effect. Because, the CBO notes, some of these babies will themselves need money from the government from Medicaid and other federal programs.

However, overall, the CBO predicts direct spending would be reduced by cutting off funds for Planned Parenthood. Mostly because, y'know, when you stop paying for something, it costs less.

The CBO says direct spending would be reduced by $156 million from 2017 to 2026, including the extra money for those several thousand births.

While this estimate is for the government, it doesn't account for is the effects on families. Unplanned pregnancies and births — as well as STIs, HIV, cervical cancer and so on — change families.

Citations: CBO: Defunding Planned Parenthood would lead to thousands more births (Washington Post)