PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte on Monday vowed the full implementation of the Reproductive Health Law, setting him on a collision course with the Catholic Church, which has consistently opposed family planning.
In his first State of the Nation Address on Monday, Duterte said it was high time for the government to give priority to promoting responsible parenthood and reproductive health, which can help the government to reduce poverty.
“The implementation of the Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health law must be put into full force and effect,” Duterte said.
Duterte said this was necessary “so that couples, especially the poor, will have freedom of informed choice on the number and spacing of children.”
If parents can adequately care and provide for their children, this will make them more productive members of the labor force, he added.
Duterte has said that the poverty rate can be pushed down to 20 percent from the current 26 percent if poor families reach the ideal family size of three children.
The implementation of the RH Law experienced setback after critics, mostly religious groups and pro-life advocates even in Congress, questioned its constitutionality before the Supreme Court.
A temporary restraining order from the Supreme Court has stopped the Department of Health from distributing contraceptives and other birth control devices, prompting Congress to cut the department’s budget for implementing the law in 2016 by nearly P1 billion.
But Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines president and Lingayen Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas reiterated the Church’s opposition to the RH Law.
But he added: “We cannot see eye-to-eye with our pro-RH brethren on this divisive issue but we can work hand-in-hand for the good of the country.”
“On the part of the Church, we must continue to teach what is right and moral. We will continue to proclaim the beauty and holiness of every human person. Through 2,000 years, the Church has lived in eras of persecution, authoritarian regimes, wars and revolutions,” Villegas said.
“The Church can continue its mission even with such unjust laws. Let us move on from being an RH-Law reactionary group…. We have a positive message to proclaim,” he said. With Catherine Mae Gonzales
Earlier, the Health department expressed concern for women who die of pregnancy and childbirth because they were deprived of family planning commodities.
“Fourteen women dying because of pregnancy or childbirth everyday is not something [that will let you] sleep peacefully at night. Think of mothers who will die,” DoH spokesman Eric Tayag told Manila Standard, referring to the Supreme Court’s temporary restraining order to stop the distribution of family planning products. With Catherine Mae Gonzales