Planned Parenthood Great Rivers from downstate Illinois offered something unique this week during the Democratic National Convention: free vasectomies and medication abortion — from a parking lot.
Illinois has become a destination for abortions, as access has vanished across much of the South and Midwest with bans and restrictions that have come since the fall of Roe v. Wade.
This week, Planned Parenthood demonstrated Illinois’ access by setting up a mobile health clinic in a parking lot on a busy corner in the West Loop, about a mile from the convention at the United Center. The clinic is in an RV, emblazoned with the words: “Health care. No matter where.”
On the second day of the mobile clinic’s hours, music played in the parking lot near a taco truck.
Inside the RV, Dr. Colleen McNicholas, chief medical officer at Planned Parenthood Great Rivers, explained why the clinic is offering free vasectomies and medication abortion during the DNC.
“We’re just really excited to provide the opportunity for the thousands of folks who are coming to Illinois to demonstrate for them that, you know, it is possible to start closing some health care gaps for folks,” McNicholas said.
Dr. Colleen McNicholas is chief medical officer at Planned Parenthood Great Rivers near St. Louis. “We’re just really excited to provide the opportunity for the thousands of folks who are coming to Illinois to demonstrate for them that, you know, it is possible to start closing some health care gaps for folks,” she said about the West Loop mobile clinic.
Manuel Martinez/WBEZ
The mobile clinic looks in part like a doctor’s office on the inside, with a bench set up as a waiting room, and two rooms with exam tables and ultrasound machines.
But during the few hours WBEZ was there, there were more reporters in the parking lot than patients. McNicholas said there were people who had signed up for appointments at the clinic, but the attention to the clinic may have made them rethink their visit.
“We did have a couple of folks not show up,” McNicholas said. “It’s hard to know why that happened. Certainly, there are protesters here, which makes accessing health care sometimes scary.”
One of those protesters was Connie Becker with Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising. She stood on the sidewalk on the other side of the fence and shouted through a megaphone aimed at the RV, while a woman sought care inside.
“You don’t have to do this,” Becker shouted. “You will never forget that you allowed these people to kill your baby out of a food truck in a parking lot in Chicago. Is that how you want to remember your child?”
People in the parking lot put up a tarp over the fence to block the protesters’ view of the RV.
McNicholas said there 10 men received free vasectomies Monday, procedures that usually cost around $800 out-of-pocket at her clinic. At least a dozen people received or signed up to end their pregnancies with pills.
Tuesday was the final day for appointments.
Kristen Schorsch covers health and county government for WBEZ.
