Opposition to contraception is hurting the Philippines. Each year, more than half of the 3.4 million pregnancies in the country are unplanned, resulting in high costs to women, their families and the national health care system. In addition, this very high rate of unintended pregnancy is impeding the Philippine’s development goals.

Yet this is not an epidemic for which there is no known solution. Unintended pregnancies are highly preventable if women have access to voluntary family planning information and services, particularly modern methods of contraception.

For full article, visit:
http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/views-and-analysis

A growing and heated debate in this predominantly Catholic country revolves around the church’s uncompromising stance against the use of contraceptive devices that is said to be contributing to poverty and affecting the quality of life for many Filipinos.

A group of 15 bishops led some 12,000 protestors at a rally here on Jul. 25 against a proposed House of Representatives bill aimed at devising a national reproductive health policy.

Pulling the other way opinion pieces in the national press have been critical of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s pro-Catholic church stand on population issues. They urged her to make a bold anti-poverty statement in the State of the Nation Address (SONA) that was delivered on Monday.

For full article, visit:
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=43412

Manila housewife Jasmin is well aware the bigger the family the bigger the potential poverty trap.

“I feel it most when we eat together because the food on the table is not enough,” said the 33-year-old mother of six who had her fallopian tubes tied to avoid getting pregnant. “So, I decided to have ligation because life is hard.”

Artificial birth control is often taboo in this staunchly Roman Catholic country. Yet with a birth rate that is one of the highest in the world, sustainable population growth is becoming a burning issue, especially as millions of poor people struggle to feed themselves at a time of high food prices.

For full article, visit:
http://www.reuters.com

POPULATION-PHILIPPINES: Catholic Church Damns The Pill

As World Population Day was being marked on Jul. 11, Tess and Andy were attending a family planning seminar as a requirement for their forthcoming wedding. It turned out to be window into one of the major problems besetting the Philippine population programme.

Because their seminar was conducted by a doctor-volunteer in a Catholic church in Manila, Tess and Andy (surname suppressed) were expecting the facilitator to toe the church’s line against artificial contraception. But they did not anticipate the kind of information that was given them and several other couples.

For full article, visit:
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=43280

From Christina Page’s Blog. See http://birthcontrolwatch.org/blog/. You can also go to http://www.allexperts.com/el/1445-9/Birth-Control/ for “advice” from Diane Cheryl on birth control.
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For anyone seeking advice about an important decision, a google search is often the gateway to frustration and confusion. That’s why allexperts.com would seem like a great idea. Allexperts.com was founded on the idea that mixing good intentions and expertise could help many. The site welcomes people who have real knowledge in an area to become “allexperts” and these “experts” agree to help those looking for answers for free. As the “about us” section of allexperts.com explains, “Our experts are all volunteers, people with knowledge in their area of expertise who are willing to share their knowledge with others. We can’t guarantee they can answer every question, but we can guarantee that most try to help.”
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Family planning groups and at least one member of Congress objected on Tuesday to a Bush administration memo that defines several widely used contraception methods as abortion and protects the right of medical providers to refuse to offer them.

The proposal would cut off federal funds to hospitals and states that attempt to compel medical providers to offer legal abortion and contraception services to women.

For full article, visit:
http://www.reuters.com

Reproductive rights advocates issued a collective condemnation Tuesday of a draft proposal by the Bush administration to set new restrictions on domestic family planning programs.

Under the draft proposal, federally funded hospitals and clinics that provide family planning services would be required to promise in writing that they will turn a blind eye to health care providers’ views on abortion and certain kinds of birth control, such as emergency contraception.

For full article, visit:
http://www.womensenews.org/article

In a spectacular act of complicity with the religious right, the Department of Health and Human Services Monday released a proposal that allows any federal grant recipient to obstruct a woman’s access to contraception. In order to do this, the Department is attempting to redefine many forms of contraception, the birth control 40% of Americans use, as abortion. Doing so protects extremists under the Weldon and Church amendments. Those laws prohibit federal grant recipients from requiring employees to help provide or refer for abortion services. The “Definitions” section of the HHS proposal states…

For full article, visit:
http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/blog/2008

The worldwide demand for family planning services is growing because of two trends: the burgeoning numbers of young people entering childbearing age and the increasing adoption of contraceptive use. “Either trend would lead to greater demand,” said Toshiko Kaneda, co-author of the Population Reference Bureau’s new data sheet, Family Planning Worldwide 2008, “but the two acting together mean there are likely to be huge increases in the future.” This PRB data sheet presents information about women, fertility rates, and contraceptive methods used in more than 150 countries. It was prepared by Donna Clifton, Toshiko Kaneda, and Lori Ashford.

The growth will be especially strong in some countries. The new data sheet shows that the number of women ages 15 to 49, the primary audience for family planning services, will jump 30 percent, from 8.9 million to 11.6 million, between 2005 and 2015 in Tanzania, for example. However, the number women using modern contraception will grow more, by 90 percent. In Peru, where use is already high and not projected to increase as much, the number of modern contraceptive users will grow from 3.7 million to 4.5 million, primarily because of population growth.

For full article, visit:
http://www.prb.org

Thanks to Dan Sherr for this article.
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Birthrates Help Keep Filipinos in Poverty, Contraceptives, Rejected by Government, Are Unaffordable for Many in Majority-Catholic Nation

Maria Susana Espinoza wanted only two children. But it was not until after the birth of her fourth child in six years that she learned any details about birth control.

“I knew it existed, but I didn’t know how it works,” said Espinoza, who lives with her husband and children in a squatter’s hut in a vast, stinking garbage dump by Manila Bay.

For full article, visit:
http://www.washingtonpost.com