The Reproductive Health law is Philippine law aiming to guarantee universal access to methods and information on birth control and maternal care. It is a way of helping people to be more advance, well prepared, and to widen up each and every individuals mind setting about our society now a day. There is this top agreement about its provisions on maternal and child health care, there is great debate on its proposal that we taxpayer and the private sector will fund and undertake widespread distribution of family planning devices such as birth control pills (BCPs) and IUDs, and as the government continue campaigning to broadcast a good information and effect on its use through health care centers nationwide. Everyone has been talking about this RH law, for some agreed and some don’t. In some part of each individual, RH law may help and it may bring into some point also that it may trigger to do such thing that will ruin someone’s life. But as the saying goes that every little thing that is too much is not good. So, it depends on how we’re going to take it and treat it as long as we are only motivated to do well and focus only to what could bring us a healthy and happy life.
The bill mandates the government to “promote, without bias, all effective natural and modern methods of family planning that are medically safe and legal.” Although abortion is recognized as illegal and punishable by law, the bill states that “the government shall ensure that all women needing care for post-abortion complications shall be treated and counseled in a humane, non-judgmental and compassionate manner.”The bill calls for a “multi-dimensional approach” integrates a component of family planning and responsible parenthood into all government anti-poverty programs. Under the bill, age-appropriate reproductive health and sexuality education is required from grade five to fourth year high school using “life-skills and other approaches.”
The bill also mandates the Department of Labor and Employment to guarantee the reproductive health rights of its female employees. Companies with less than 200 workers are required to enter into partnership with health care providers in their area for the delivery of reproductive health services. Employers with more than 200 employees shall provide reproductive health services to all employees in their own respective health facilities. Those with less than 200 workers shall enter into partnerships with health professionals for the delivery of reproductive health services. Employers shall inform employees of the availability of family planning services. They are also obliged to monitor pregnant working employees among their workforce and ensure they are provided paid half-day prenatal medical leaves for each month of the pregnancy period that they are employed. The national government and local governments will ensure the availability of reproductive health care services, including family planning and prenatal care. Any person or public official who prohibits or restricts the delivery of legal and medically safe reproductive health care services will be meted penalty by imprisonment or a fine.
The CBCP and Roman Catholic Church strongly protest the bill because it’s immoral and according to them will set the stage for other anti-life laws or so-called D.E.A.T.H. bills (acronym for death, euthanasia, abortion, two-child policy, and homosexuality).
On the other hand President Aquino and some members of Congress believe that the bill will promote sustainable human development in the country, it is needed to reduce high birthrates among the poor. The United Nations stated in 2002 that “family planning and reproductive health are essential to reducing poverty”.
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THOSE THAT SUPPORT THE RH ARGUE THAT: 1. Economic studies, especially the experience in Asia show that rapid population growth and high fertility rates, especially among the poor, exacerbate poverty and make it harder for the government to address it. 2. Empirical studies show that poverty incidence is higher among big families. Smaller families and wider birth intervals could allow families to invest more in each child’s education, health, and nutrition which will eventually reduce poverty and hunger at the household level. 3. Maternal deaths could be reduced if they had access to basic healthcare and essential minerals like iron and calcium, according to the DOH. 4. Studies show that 44% of the pregnancies in poor families are unanticipated, and among the poorest women who would like to avoid pregnancy at least 41% do not use any contraceptive method because of lack of information or access. “Among the poorest families, 22% of married women of reproductive age express a desire to avoid pregnancies but are still not using any family planning method. 5. Use of contraception, which the World Health Organization has listed as essential medicines, will lower the rate of abortions as it has done in other parts of the world, according to the Guttmacher Institute. 6. An SWS survey of 2008 showed that 71% of the respondents are in favor of the bill. 7. At the heart of the bill is the free choice given to people on the use of reproductive health, enabling the people, especially the poor to have the number of children they want and can care for.
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THOSE THAT OPPOSE THE RH BILL ARGUE THAT: 1. “The world’s leading scientific experts” have resolved the issues related to the bill and show that the “RH Bill is based on wrong economics” as the 2003 Rand Corporation study shows that “there is little cross-country evidence that population growth impedes or promotes economic growth”. 2. The bill takes away limited government funds from treating many high priority medical and food needs and transfers them to fund objectively harmful and deadly devices. The latest studies in scientific journals and organizations show that the ordinary birth control pills and the IUD kill the embryonic human, who as such are human beings equally worthy of respect, making the bill unconstitutional. 3. US National Defense has shown empirical evidence that contraceptives have deleterious social effects (abortion, premarital sex, female impoverishment, fatherless children, teenage pregnancies, and poverty). Harvard School of Public Health observes that ‘when people think they’re made safe by using condoms at least some of the time, they actually engage in riskier sex’, in the phenomenon called “risk compensation”. There is evidence for increased risk of cancer (breast, cervical, liver) as well as significant increase of risk for heart attack and stroke for current users of oral contraceptives. The increased usage of contraceptives, which implies that some babies are unwanted, will eventually lead to more abortion; the correlation was shown in a scientific journal and acknowledged by pro-RH leaders. 4. People’s freedom to access contraceptives is not restricted by any opposing law, being available in family planning NGOs, stores, etc. The Philippines is not a welfare state: taxpayer’s money should not be used for personal practices that are harmful and immoral; it can be used to inform people of the harm of BCPs. 5. The penal provisions constitute a violation of free choice and conscience, and establish religious persecution.