Summary and analysis of
Planned Parenthood’s
operation in the United States

Behind the numbers

PPFA conducts its operations through an organization composed of affiliates and clinics throughout the United States. Affiliates cover a geographic area and each affiliate operates a number of clinics within that area.

According to the 1997/98 PPFA Annual Report, it currently has 133 affiliates operating 850 clinics. This is a large operation, but is actually much smaller than Planned Parenthood used to be.

As the chart below indicates, PPFA has actually seen a 26% decline in the number of its affiliates since 1987 (going from 181 to 133). In addition, after years of a steady increase, the number of clinics operated by PPFA has dropped 9% in the last three years (from 938 in 1995 to 850).

The decline in the number of affiliates has been driven mostly by financial decisions. Affiliates that were not operating at a sufficient profit were merged with others to reduce costs. In addition, PPFA, over the last two years, closed down its operations in Mississippi and Hawaii—thus reducing the number of affiliates and clinics.

More disturbing to Planned Parenthood is the decrease in the number of its clinics. Back in 1993, newspapers carried stories of Planned Parenthood's plans to do a massive fund raising campaign with a goal of increasing its number of clinics to 2,000 by the year 2000.

Despite its efforts, however, the number of clinics has been declining and now stands at its lowest level since 1988. STOPP attributes this decline to more vocal and more active opposition to Planned Parenthood programs across the United States.

Looking at Planned Parenthood financial data on the summary page, we see that, despite the reduction in the number of clinics, PPFA's costs for "Patient Services" continue to increase. This means that the cost of maintaining an average clinic is rising. STOPP calculates that the average clinic costs PPFA $378,000 a year today—a 25 percent increase in the last five years.

Thus, unless PPFA can attract over 3,800 customers to each of its clinics every year, it will continue to have to expand its high dollar services (abortion), charge more for its current services, get more government money to cover its operational losses, or close down more of its clinics.