MUST READ: Founder of Komen's Own Words

I was going to just write a rant about my personal experience when a Planned Parenthood-enabled mammogram told me I didn't have breast cancer. Then I was going to put a link to a beautifully succinct message from the Komen boards from a woman whose breast cancer was discovered via a Planned Parenthood prescribed mammogram.

Then I found this article from the LA Times: Komen Officials Say It's Not About Abortion in which most of the points that I wanted to make have been tangentially made by Nancy Brinker, founder & Chief Executive of Komen, falling over her own feet.

Reading it, I planned to discuss the double standard of paragraph 6, where Brinker said that they were cutting funding to all institutions under investigation, but neither she nor the reporter made a peep about grants going to Penn State (currently under federal, state, *and* local investigation for covering up long-term pedophilic predation).

Then I was going to crow about Brinker herself putting the lie to "poor women can just go elsewhere" in paragraph 8, when she admitted that several Planned Parenthood branches will still receive funding "because it provides services that cannot be replaced through grants to another organization."

But it's paragraphs 9 & 10 that stopped me in my tracks:
Komen officials also said that the Planned Parenthood's breast-health programs may not be the best use of its funds. While women can receive clinical breast exams at Planned Parenthood clinics, patients are referred to other medical facilities for mammograms, biopsies and cancer treatment. Brinker referred to this model as "pass-through" services.

"We look at the quality of the grants," Brinker said. "This isn't about funding the same thing over and over. It's about how can we get better? We don't like to do pass-through grants any more."

You know who else doesn't do mammograms, biopsies, and cancer treatment? ALL OB/GYNs! My doctor writes me a presciption to get a mammogram; she sent the stuff she removed from me out to a lab for biopsy; and if it did turn out to be cancerous, we would have discussed her referring me to an oncologist. She is the coordinator and the medical expertise, but she does none of this work herself. She passes it through to the other experts.

THE FOUNDER OF THE KOMEN FOUNDATION JUST TOLD A REPORTER THAT KOMEN CONSIDERS THE WORK DONE BY EVERY OB/GYN IN THIS COUNTRY -- INCLUDING MAMMOGRAM REFERRALS -- TO BE SOMETHING THEY "DON'T LIKE" TO GIVE GRANTS TO ANYMORE.

Spread this far and wide. This isn't about abortion, this isn't even about Planned Parenthood. This is about the expressed opinion of the director and founder of Susan G Komen for the Cure regarding mammogram referrals, no matter where they come from.

Apology Not Accepted Until You Address The Real Problem

I see that 3 days of intense blowback both externally and internally (the forum posts were running something like 30 to 1 against the defund decision) has made the Komen foundation back down.

Sort of.

The policy of denying grants to institutions under investigation has been clarified to say "criminal investigation." This takes Planned Parenthood off one chopping block... but there's still no word about dropping the Komen grant to Penn State, which certainly is under criminal investigation.

Furthermore, the apology doesn't clarifiy any of the other problematic issues, not the least of which is the fact that the congressional investigation is only one of the reasons that Komen has cited for its reason to drop PP funding in the first place. Certainly the apology dances around my biggest area of concern: the horrific decision by Komen's founder and chief executive to cite mammogram referrals as a "pass through" service that she (and thus Komen) considers to be "funding the same thing over and over" and that "We don't like to do pass-through grants any more." (All quotes direct from Brinker as cited in this LA Times article.)

Breast exams and mammograms are how breast cancer is detected. The standard medical practice for both poor and rich women is to go to a gynocologist who performs a breast exam and writes a referral for a mammogram if that doctor feels it necessary. The Komen Foundation may have apologized for pissing off PP supporters, but there hasn't been a peep about their incredibly problematic announcement they "don't like to do" grants for *the standard practice for detecting breast cancer* any more.

If you're not going to be about finding breast cancer, just curing it, then say so. If you're going to be about finding breast cancer and you don't like the nation-wide model for detection, develop and fund an alternative. But FFS don't say you're for finding and curing breast cancer and then blow off the method of detection as used by all doctors as something you "don't like" to fund!