Study reveals glaring issues on abortion

By NINFA BARCENA-QUIRANTE, (PIA Samar)
July 2, 2006

CATBALOGAN, Samar – “Not all women who experience complications receive treatment because they die before obtaining care!”

Dr. Josefina Cabigon of the University of the Philippines Population Institute (UPPI) was referring to abortion, the leading cause of maternal mortality, the study showed.

In the Regional Kapihan at the Hotel Alejandro in Tacloban City jointly conducted by PopCom and PIA 8, several jolting revelations were exposed to the Samar media.

Another alarming issue was the glaring figure that an estimated number of 473,000 women had induced abortions in 2000.

According to the study, only 105,000 women have been hospitalized for complications. Some women do not submit to medical care as they do not experience complications, still some 78,900 develop complications and some 800 of them die.

Abortion, Cabigon added has just been treated recently as a public health issue though it may have occurred since time immemorial.

Cabigon shared that it was difficult to conduct the study because the women themselves did not own up to committing the act for fear of reprisal.

One of the reactors to the presented study, Atty. Imelda Nartea emphasized that laws on abortion are specific and anybody who practices it is punishable under the provisions of the Revised Penal Code.

When asked why some women would resort to this practice that may even cause their own deaths; reasons pointed to economics. In the study, 72% of those who admitted having had abortion said that it is expensive to raise a baby.

The general trend in induced abortion is increasing from 1994 to 2000 as estimated from hospital records.

Low contraceptive use and high unmet needs for contraception contribute to induced abortion, it said.

There is no specific sector of society committing abortion; study showed that women from all segments of society do.

Majority of these women experiencing induced abortion had at least high school education, it said. While they maybe educated by the common standard, education regarding the risk of induced abortion has to be intensified, Cabigon noted.

She advised media to help in disseminating information on the perils of induced abortion.

In this extreme situation said a statement (from Agapay, Ethics and the Filipino, 1999) the parents would be the criminal, the judge and the executioners and the child has no fighting chance to survive.