I am grateful to the majority of the Maine Legislature for voting in favor of LD 143, An Act to Improve Women’s Health and Economic Security by Funding Family Planning Services, and want to now encourage our elected officials to fully fund the initiative. Now is the time for Mainers to take care of our families and communities.

With so many of our “safety net” community services being razored under the current federal administration — including withholding of funding to help low-income people access family planning care through a program called Title X — local support of critical health services here at home is more important now than ever before.

The state of Maine has long recognized that prevention services save lives and decrease health care costs. In the early 2000s, before MaineCare’s expansion increased screening and health care for more than 100,000 additional Mainers in 2014, I enrolled uninsured patients in the Maine Breast and Cervical Health Program. It was my first adult job: I worked as a medical assistant at a family planning clinic above a WIC (Women, Infants, Children) office in western Maine.

I met hundreds of women — and some men — who came for services. I learned about cervical cancer screening with pap smears, mammograms to detect breast cancer, contraception and how to test for sexually transmitted infections (STI) like chlamydia. I saw firsthand how important early detection, diagnosis and treatment is for infections and diseases.

I also realized that family planning providers are often the first and only medical provider patients see in a year, especially if they struggle to pay for care. This is still true. In 2023, Maine’s family planning sites served more than 31,000 patients, 70% of whom qualified for free or reduced-cost care.

I am still serving Mainers’ medical needs, now as a full-spectrum family medicine doctor specializing in sexual and reproductive care who has screened and treated thousands of people. These days, I worry about many public health threats: the spread of dangerous and preventable diseases like measles (as of May 8, the CDC reported more than 1,000 cases in 31 states), restrictions and threats to reproductive health care resulting in an alarming increase in the nation’s maternal mortality rate, the safety of our nation’s immigrants and refugees from wrongful deportation and imprisonment and more. Maine is not immune to health threats. Many areas of the state are designated medically underserved. Mainers are struggling to afford housing, food and health care.

As a physician who takes care of pregnant people and delivers babies, I am particularly alarmed that nine Maine hospitals have closed their labor and delivery units in the past decade, with two more closing later this year. I know firsthand how the closure of birthing centers around the state affects families. Rural families, especially, are required to travel greater distances to access care. Funding LD 143 is one way to help prevent further closures of clinics and facilities that are providing sexual and reproductive healthcare to Mainers, including mothers and parents.

LD 143 will help safeguard Maine’s family planning network so that the most vulnerable people can access essential health care they need.

Reliable access to contraception is associated with significant increases in educational attainment and economic mobility for women and people who can get pregnant. And the benefit crosses generations! Even the children of parents who were able to plan pregnancies have a higher level of college education and higher earning potential.

Access to contraception also provides substantial reductions in unplanned pregnancies and the high costs associated with those pregnancies. Pregnancy testing allows pregnant people to make informed decisions early and, if they choose to carry their pregnancy to term, to do so with greater success.

Maine’s family planning provider network is facing a critical funding crisis. Ongoing political attacks are putting Mainers’ access to family planning care at risk. I’m proud that our state lawmakers have so far stood against attacks and prioritized expanding access to essential reproductive health care. Right now, we need these elected leaders to support the health of our communities by fully funding LD 143.