Reproductive health bill?

Reproductive health bill

There appears to be three major points of view from which to approach the controversial
reproductive health bill now pending with the House of Representatives for plenary
deliberations, namely: legal, moral, and scientific. This is so since, the proposed legislative
measure once enacted into law will affect society writ large. In short, there are many
stakeholders by differing institutional concerns. It then becomes difficult to erect a tripod to
hold the issue that has carried so much weight.

There are those who think, once legislated, HB 812 or the proposed Reproductive Health
Care Act of 2008 will in fact 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). The problem
that has been viciously overlooked in our legislative mill is the fact that legislators themselves
violate the rule that a bill should have only one subject matter. Truth is, HB 812 may have to
be broken up into separate bills and for that matter into separate laws. An evolving culture of
“aquarium legislation” is tantamount to a constitutional violation of the legislative process.

Up until today, there is a serious opposition to a reproductive health bill in whatever form or
substance it comes simply because there are such groups or organizations that are against it.
For instance, the CBCP is against it and for that matter other like-minded Catholic sub-
groups. True enough, from the time it was first filed in the past Congresses, the bill already
experienced a string of failures – to be passed into law – owing to provisions that are
questionable legally, morally, and scientifically. It can be said that again, this proposed HB
812 may go through another rough sailing unless it can be railroaded in Congress and Senate.

One theory stands in defense of the bill which claims it is necessary in order to curb
population growth which is now pegged at 86 million Filipinos as well as for the sake of
limited resources such as rice. But the myth of this Malthusian fear has already been settled
long ago and it does not anymore hold water. Why a ‘zero population growth’ as that which
was a matter of policy in the whole of the United States and Europe? If we consider the
earnings being remitted into our country from OFWs as the single factor that buoys up our
fledging if pale economy, then we should have no reason to argue against this bill. That ‘zero
population policy’ practiced by countries in the First Bloc now reached the irreversible
scenario of a graying population that depletes their respective economies in heavy state
subsidies. Is it then a boon or bane?

The National Academy of Science and Technology supports reproductive health bill. The
Catholic Church or the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines does not. There are
pro-life advocates versus pro-choice advocates. This camp says it involves no abortion,
another camp says otherwise. This group claims contraceptives to be abortifacient, another
such group claims it is not so. Within the legal community, a wedge divides their sentiments
as to whether it is against the Divine Law to allow any room of choice toward abortion or to
some extent euthanasia. Cases of abortion do sometimes involve “life-boat ethics” – that
Catch 22 of having to choose which person to save – the unborn babe or the mother. There
are issues at every loop, claims at every turn, and cries in every direction the bill takes – for
or against.

Moralists, legalists, scientists follow their own lines of thinking that are parallel unto one
another – no lines intersect. There is where the problem lies. Is it then possible to weave
from various strands or threads a beautiful tapestry of the proposed bill? Has it become time
to curb population growth or corruption? Incidentally, the Secretary of Health announced
that an initial amount of P150 billion as start-up fund is intended for this project in terms of
the “infrastructure” to get it going. Fact is, some P2 billion will be so allocated just for
condoms or like medicines or drugs. Is this the reason that politicians as legislators
incessantly lobby for the reproductive health bill to be legislated into law?

My good friend, lawyer Jo Imbong, legal counsel of CBCP really thinks it is unconstitutional
in that it violates Article XVI, Section 9 as well as Article XIII, Section 14 of the Constitution.
My former boss, Rep. Rene Velarde of Buhay Party-List is strongly against it in furtherance
of the pro-life advocacy of the party which made it number 1 in the election chart overturning
Bayan. Other well-meaning personages are against the idea of an abortion, first and
foremost. Proponents of the bill however, argue that none of it is contemplated. But that can
be mere lip service to sweet-talk us all to believe the proposed law will not violate any of the
provisions of the Constitution in so far as the unborn, children, mothers, women, and
marginalized are concerned. Nor can it be claimed that the reproductive health bill stands on
solid ground when in fact, it stands on an ice floe that would soon melt at the heat of debate
and crumble to the bottom.

At the end of the day, the proposed measure ought to be restudied very carefully beyond the
prevailing points of view. A recent study of the UP School of Economics tended to have
oversimplified it as one of a situation that placed the various stakeholders between a hard
Church and a soft State. It went on to state that the RH bill is in fact pro-poor, pro-life, and
pro-family. We sure have all different sense on the matter but honestly, I have only one
misgiving in the provisions of the bill that would – by any number and extent –
accommodate, in effect, post-abortion cases as part of the whole program. Thus, for the
proponent to honestly claim there is no such abortion in cases where there would clearly be,
crystal clear enough – is simply begging the question.

PRIMER C. PAGUNURAN
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