Bill to Increase Access to Contraception Is Dividing Filipinos

The steps the woman in the story took are so common.  Using the drug known as the “abortion pill” was discovered in Brazil (by women using it for the same purposes–”don’t use this ulcer medicine because it may cause abortion”), and is now available in the US for medical abortion.  In developing nations, access is significantly more restricted (for various reasons).

Legislation before the Philippine Congress, called the Reproductive Health and Population Development Act, would require governments down to the local level to provide free or low-cost reproductive health services, including condoms, birth control pills, tubal ligations and vasectomies. It would also mandate sex education in all schools, public and private, from fifth grade through high school.

waaaaaah my heart is leaping.  YES YES YES

Most of those unintended pregnancies — 92 percent — resulted from not using birth control, the institute said, and the rest from birth control that failed. Those unintended pregnancies, the institute says, contributed to an estimated half-million abortions that year, despite a ban on the procedure. Most of the abortions are done clandestinely and in unsanitary conditions. Many women resort to crude methods like those Ms. Judilla tried.

This is why we need it!

The bill’s main proponent in Congress, Representative Edcel C. Lagman, also says there is a need for a check on population growth in the interest of national welfare. The Philippine population is estimated at 98 million and is growing at more than 2 percent annually, one of the highest rates in Asia. “Unbridled population growth stunts socioeconomic development and aggravates poverty,” Mr. Lagman wrote in an op-ed column in The Philippine Daily Inquirer recently.

Truefuckingstory.

“The Constitution is very clear that the state should protect life from conception up to its natural end,” Father Castro said.“Regardless of their religion, Filipinos are God-fearing and family-loving. This bill will change that culture.”

Ugh.  Anyways, this says nothing about CONTRAception.  So at least push for that.  I hate politics.  I hate the Catholic church.  This is poo.  And frustrating.  I’m Filipino, I’m not God-fearing–don’t put your religion on me.

“Contrary to what many are saying, that policy was meant to protect women, to protect their wombs from those who want to take away life,” he said.

EXACTLY!