The RH Bill as pro-poor

We therefore support the RH Bill because we believe that it will help the poor develop and expand their capabilities, so as to lead more worthwhile lives befitting their dignity and destiny as human beings. It is unconscionable that while the richest in our society are able to attain the number of children that they desire and can support, the poorest, on the other hand, are left struggling to break the chain of intergenerational poverty caused partly by a large family size that impairs their capacity to feed, educate, and take care of their children.

The RH Bill has a number of provisions that are explicitly pro-poor, such as section 11 mandating each Congressional District to undertake the “acquisition, operation and maintenance” of “a van to be known as the Mobile Health Care Service (MHCS) to deliver care, goods and services to its constituents, more particularly to the poor and needy [italics ours], as well as disseminate knowledge and information on reproductive health.” However, we would like to focus our attention on the pro-poor benefits offered by section 1, which states that “[t]he State... guarantees universal access to medically-safe, legal, affordable, and quality reproductive health care services, methods, devices, supplies and relevant information thereon even as it prioritizes the needs of women and children, among other underprivileged sectors [italics ours].”

In relation to the above, section 8 of the RH bill defines contraceptives as essential medicines, in recognition that family planning reduces the incidence of maternal and infant mortality. By placing “hormonal contraceptives, intrauterine devices, injectables and other allied reproductive health products and supplies” under the category of “essential medicines and supplies,” they shall thus be included in the regular purchase of essential medicines and supplies of all national and local hospitals and other government health units. Moreover, section 9 of the bill guarantees hospital-based family planning for contraceptive methods requiring hospital services. These include tubal ligation, vasectomy, and intrauterine device insertion, which shall be made available in all national and local government hospitals. For “indigent patients,” these services “shall be fully covered by PhilHealth insurance and/or government financial assistance.”

Treating contraceptives as essential medicines and guaranteeing hospital-based family planning will make family planning products, supplies, and procedures available at all national and local government hospitals. This is a decidedly pro-poor measure, in view of the fact that the majority (58.1%) of Filipinos who use modern artificial family planning methods rely on the government for their supply of contraceptives (NSO, 2006 FPS). Thus, by expanding Filipinos’ access to the family planning method (whether modern NFP or modern artificial FP, “with no bias for either”) that is best suited to their needs and personal convictions, the RH Bill has the real potential to make safe and reliable family planning available to all Filipinos, and not only to the 50.6 percent practicing it in one way or another (ibid.). This becomes more important in light of the government’s acknowledgment that it has a “low probability” of meeting the Millennium Development Goal target of raising the country’s contraceptive prevalence rate from 50.6 percent in 2006 to 80 percent in 2015 (NEDA and UNCT 2007).

To recapitulate, the RH Bill does not only safeguard life by seeking to avert abortions and maternal and infant deaths. It also promotes quality of life, by enabling couples, especially the poor, to bring into the world only the number of children they believe they can care for and nurture to become healthy and productive members of our society.