EDITORIAL - Fatal lack of knowledge

The numbers may seem overblown, but a New York-based policy research organization is not the first to point out that mothers and babies die of birth-related illnesses due to lack of knowledge on sexual and reproductive health. The Guttmacher Institute, in a study on women’s contraceptive needs in the Philippines, reported that about 2,600 mothers and 52,000 babies died in the country last year from unwanted pregnancies and birth-related causes.

The study recorded 4,600 pregnancy-related deaths in the country last year, of which 2,600 were attributed to complications including abortion. The 52,000 babies died before reaching their first birthday, the report added. Those deaths could have been prevented if the mothers had access to reproductive health care and family planning programs, according to the Forum for Family Planning and Development.

Protecting mothers and babies is a key aim of the Reproductive Health Bill, which is awaiting Congress’ approval. The numbers cited in the Guttmacher report will probably mean nothing to many lawmakers, whose families have the education and financial means for female members to space childbirths and resort to contraception if they want. The lack of access to information on reproductive health and family planning programs is a problem mainly of impoverished women.

Those women cannot be kept forever in the dark about their own reproductive rights and the choices open to them in planning their families. Advocates of the reproductive health bill are not advocating abortion or the forced termination of a pregnancy. There would be no need for this bill if the executive branch had the political will to antagonize the Catholic Church and implement an effective family planning program. But the secretary of health himself has said that family planning is not a priority of the administration. And so women with sufficient information and financial means can space their childbirths while impoverished women who can benefit from family planning are denied such access. In thousands of cases, such lack of access and deprivation of knowledge has led to death.