Billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott has donated $275m to women's reproductive healthcare provider Planned Parenthood, the largest gift ever made to the organisation by a single donor.
The donation to Planned Parenthood Federation of America and 21 of its affiliates was made as a part of Ms Scott's pledge to give away the majority of her wealth, she announced on Wednesday through a blog post.
Planned Parenthood provides abortions and other healthcare services at its clinics across the US and has been at the frontline fighting for women's right to abortion. There has been a sharp fall in access to safe abortions in the US as Republican-led states pass ever-tighter restrictions on the procedure.
"We are incredibly grateful for Ms Scott’s extraordinary philanthropic investment in Planned Parenthood, as a critical part of the public health infrastructure," the nonprofit's chief executive Alexis McGill Johnson said in a statement.
"This funding will support our efforts to advance health equity by eliminating racial and structural barriers for our patients in the communities where Planned Parenthood works," it read.
Ms Scott revealed that she has donated $3.8bn to 465 nonprofits, taking her donations disclosed in public to more than $12bn since 2019.
"Our team’s focus over these last nine months has included some new areas, but as always our aim has been to support the needs of underrepresented people from groups of all kinds. The cause of equity has no sides," she wrote.
“The cause of equity has no sides. Nor can it have a single solution.”
According to her, 60 per cent of the groups she donated were led by women and 75 per cent are led by “people with lived experience in the regions they support and the issues they seek to address".
Nonprofit Habitat for Humanity announced on Tuesday that Ms Scott had donated $436m, which will go toward affordable housing and Black homeownership.
Ms Scott, now married to Seattle science teacher Dan Jewett, received a four per cent stake in Amazon.com as a part of her divorce settlement from founder Jeff Bezos.
She signed the Giving Pledge, through which many billionaires have promised to donate more than half of their wealth.
According to Forbes, Ms Scott's net worth is about $48bn.
