The newly elected leaders in the House of Representatives have launched the most devastating legislative assault on women’s health care in American history. They want to eliminate Title X, the national family planning program that has provided millions of women with preventive care since 1970, when Richard Nixon signed it into law. In addition, they want to stop Planned Parenthood from receiving any federal funds that support the lifesaving health care and education they provide at more than 800 health centers across the country.

At a time when fewer and fewer people can afford health care due to increasing costs and a struggling economy, the House leadership wants to completely gut the programs that provide birth control, family planning, lifesaving cancer screenings and HIV testing, among other services, to millions of women.

Simply put, this legislative attack will cut off health care access for the women who need it the most, including tens of thousands of women here in our own state who rely on Planned Parenthood’s 27 Wisconsin health centers for their primary and preventive care.

Clearly, these are dangerous political attacks that have no basis in common sense. For those who really want to save money, family planning programs like Title X are fiscally sound. For every public dollar invested in family planning, taxpayers save nearly $4. Yet, in their overzealous determination to attack women’s health, the House leadership doesn’t seem to care.

This health care saves lives – yet the new House leadership wants to take it away when working families need it the most. Politically targeting women’s health programs and Planned Parenthood means that women across the country will lose access to basic primary and preventive health care. That means more women will go untreated and that we’ll face many more dangerous issues, such as undetected cancers discovered too late to save lives.

As the student organization of Planned Parenthood Advocates of Wisconsin, Advocates for Choice is working to block these ridiculous assaults on women’s health. It’s not just about protecting women; it’s about protecting the health care of an entire community, an entire state – even an entire country. Jake Begun reminded us in an opinion piece last week that as students, this issue affects all of us in more ways than we may think. Now, it’s our job to take action.

Please join Advocates for Choice and Planned Parenthood in our efforts to oppose this legislation, and to make sure we don’t see similar attacks coming from Wisconsin’s Capitol building. As young adults in need of affordable reproductive health care, we simply can’t sit back and watch extreme politicians take the health care we rely on away from us. We are supportive, we are smart, we are more powerful than we believe: In Wisconsin, we’re better than this.

Grace Colas ([email protected]) is a sophomore majoring in women’s studies and Spanish. She is a member of UW-Madison Advocates for Choice ([email protected]).