First off, let me locate my initial mooring in the discussion of the RH bill as it hugged the headlines today where Pulse Asia survey claims that 69% of the population favors the Lagman bill.
Just to keep abreast with this widely-publicized result, let us take a cursory review of the explanatory note that normally precedes the main text of a proposed legislative measure as they are filed in either House of Representatives or the Senate.
An explanatory note usually states the reasons for a bill, the intended beneficiaries and the general wisdom, if any, that should be consistent with the fundamental law of the land. These elements are deemed fairly satisfied in this bill authored singly by Rep. Edcel Lagman in this 15th Congress except that it acknowledges the fact that nothing in the Constitution’s declared policies delves on any notion of reproductive health much less on any threat that could possibly arise from population growth.
Reading the ‘frame of mind’ of the bill’s author using the explanatory note is supposed to help readers understand what the real and true import of the legislative measure is but only, if and when, assumptions so made have some reasonable factual and accurate basis. Absent these, a right-thinking reader would need to do more independent research as those which a bias position will not so provide.
The title, “An Act Providing for a National Policy on Reproductive Health, Responsible Parenthood and Population Development, and For Other Purposes”, alone implies a ‘negative certification’ in that nothing in the Constitution certifies any need for such a national policy along that line. I am of the contention that this serum cannot be injected into the body polity unless that body polity is first replaced – in this case, through charter change.
Not one section in the 1987 Constitution’s bill of rights could it be found any germ of an idea supportive of the claim that ‘reproductive health has long been considered a basic universal human right’ and so therefore how can we really connect the dots?
Huff wrote a book, “How to lie with statistics?” and in fact, this is one of minor readings expected of would-be policy analyst at the state university. Point is, the many statistical data that merely reflect a ‘list of likes, wants and wills (e.g. will help reduce poverty, will help improve maternal health, etc.)’ although they have shown semblance of some source references are hardly valid causal explanation of stated concerns.
For example, it requires abstraction to understand the statement that “2.6 million Filipino women would like to plan their families but lack information and access to do so (Family Planning Survey 2006)”. Consider another one, “the poorest Filipinas are still having an average of 6 children (this is almost 3 times their desired number of children) – FPS 2006”. In this latter example, it requires no less than mathematical abstraction to know that the desired number is the numerical 2. Of course, readers can go on and on – ad nausea.
The uncharacteristic claim that “the bill is definitely pro-life” in the context that it prevents infant and child deaths even provides greater discomfort. Quite consistent enough, the bill further states – “at the heart of the bill is freedom of informed choice” – in the sense that ‘women have the inherent right over their own bodies’.
In the textual part of the bill, the definition of “reproductive health care” (Sec. 4 [19]), the shadow of abortion presumably comes from what explains the shadow. In short, it cannot proscribe abortion if it does in fact, manage abortion.