PHILIPPINES: Criminal Ban, Stigma Drive Unsafe Abortions
By Diana Mendoza
MANILA, Sep 2 (IPS) "I felt scared. When I looked around, all the
mothers had
finished giving birth, while I was still there. The blood that
flowed from me had already dried and caked onto my body,"
Lisa, a 19-year-old married mother of three, says, recounting
her experience in post-abortion care at a public hospital here
in the Philippine capital.
Lisa was haemorrhaging when she was rushed to the Gat
Andres Bonifacio Memorial Medical Centre hospital, a week
after suffering high fever, severe pain and bleeding as a
result of her attempt to induce abortion by drinking brandy
and vino de quina, a rice wine believed to induce post-
partum bleeding.
Lisa was one of the Filipino women cited in ‘Forsaken
Lives: The Harmful Impact of the Philippine Criminal
Abortion Ban’ published in August by the New York-based
Centre for Reproductive Rights (CRR), the first
comprehensive report on the impact of the ban on abortion in
this mainly Catholic country in South-east Asia.
According to the 126-page report that was the result of
two years’ research, Lisa experienced a range of abuses when
she sought medical care, including being physically bound,
having her privacy violated, and verbally abused by doctors
and nurses who threatened to report her to the police
because she had aborted her baby.
Every year, the report added, 560,000 Filipino women turn
to abortion. It said 90,000 of them suffer from
complications, and 1,000 die from crude and extremely
painful methods such as intense abdominal massages by
traditional midwives, the insertion of catheters into the
uterus and the medically unsupervised consumption of
Cytotec, the local brand name of a drug containing
misoprostol to induce uterine contractions, and the
ingestion of herbs and other concoctions sold by street
vendors.
These situations happen because women with unwanted
pregnancies are driven to go underground to seek abortions,
which are illegal under Philippine law.
Abortion-related complications are among the top 10
reasons for the hospitalisation of Filipino women in this
country of 94 million people, making it a public health
concern. The country’s population is growing by 1.96 percent
annually and its total fertility rate is 3.23, or an average
of three children per woman of child-bearing age. Some two
million births are added every year.
Health advocates say that the criminal ban on abortion –
in a Catholic culture that attaches heavy stigma to it and
where modern contraception is cause for controversy – leaves
Filipino women with unwanted pregnancies little choice but
to go for unsafe abortions despite their deadly risks.
The public discussion of abortion gets caught in moral
arguments, mainly by the powerful Catholic Church, which
objects to reproductive health initiatives.
"Abortions are going on and here we are," said Florence
Tadiar, president of the Institute for Social Studies and
Action, which advocates for women’s health and rights.
She says that dialogues have been held between Catholic
bishops and the government on sexuality education and
responsible parenthood to help curb unwanted pregnancies,
but they avoid sensitive matters such as a bill on
reproductive health. "We in the civil society organisations
also wanted to talk to them because we wanted to explain
that the bill prevents (women from seeking) abortion, but
they don’t want to level with us," she explained.
A few days after the CRR report’s release, Archbishop
Oscar Cruz said "contraception prevents life".
"There is no specific law in the country to address this
public health problem (maternal deaths from abortion)," said
Clara Rita Padilla, executive director of the advocacy group
EnGendeRights.
The CRR says that the Philippines is among only a few
countries that prohibit and criminally punish abortion
without recognising clear legal exceptions, such as if a
woman’s pregnancy poses a threat to her life or health, if
she is a victim of rape or incest, or in cases of fetal
impairment.
"The Philippine government has created a dire human
rights crisis in the country," CRR president Nancy Northup
in a statement released with the report. "Thousands of women
resort to abortion to protect their health, families, and
livelihood. Yet, the government sits idly by refusing to
tackle the issue or reform the policies that exacerbate it."
Melissa Upreti, CRR legal adviser for Asia, says while
most Catholic countries such as Nicaragua, Chile and El
Salvador criminalise abortion, the Philippines stands out
due to its extreme law and blanket prohibition. "The law has
created an environment of judgment and stigma – women who
seek medical treatment for abortion-related complications
are often harassed and abused by health providers or given
substandard quality of care," she said.
The situation is worsened by an "antiquated" law that
Spain, the Philippines’ former coloniser, passed in 1887,
and is reflected in the 1972 Revised Penal Code that makes
abortion a punishable offence with no clear exceptions, adds
Alfredo Tadiar, a former judge who heads the International
Development Law Organisation.
The hostile environment is such that service providers of
maternal and child health care, such as nurses, doctors and
midwives, are also arrested, Tadiar explains. "This is
enough to chill the situation," he said. "No service
provider is safe."
Tadiar adds that health care providers of hospitals
supervised by local governments are required to report to
police the abortion cases they handle. Mayors have also
ordered bans on local clinics’ provision of modern
contraception, including the birth control pill.
These issues are so politically risky for those seeking
public office that the reproductive health bill has not
gotten anywhere in Congress. The Church says the bill is
"anti-family and anti-life", and Cruz says it is only "for
population-reduction purposes, not the improvement of life".
Abortion is an even trickier issue. "If it faces unending
opposition particularly from the Catholic church that uses
abortion to defeat measures proposing access to safe family
planning services, including abortion-related complications,
then a separate bill on legal abortion under special
circumstances faces an even more difficult future," Padilla
pointed out.
