RH bill debates should involve sex workers, STD victims, says NGO

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LEGAZPI CITY—HUNDREDS of nameless people vulnerable to HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases should also be heard in the heating up debates on the passage of the Reproductive Health Bill, an official of a nongovernment organization said.

Cristita Triunfante, executive director of the Mayon International Development Alternatives and Services Inc. (Midas), said she lamented the seemingly “myopic” view that some people had on the controversial bill.

Current debates are only centered on whether population control will alleviate poverty or whether the legislation is moral or immoral, she said.

“But these are not only the important aspects. Critics of the bill need to have a holistic view by looking into all other elements of reproductive health,” she said.

Midas is a nongovernment organization partnering with the Global Fund AIDS project in preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS and other STDs through education and policy advocacies.

It reaches out to three groups most vulnerable to sexually transmitted infection (STI)—people in prostitution, male having sex with male persons, and migrant workers—by educating them on HIV/AIDS and other STDs and giving them contraceptives.

From January to September, Midas has reached out to 2,223 people in four areas in Bicol with high incidence of STI—the cities of Tabaco and Legazpi in Albay, and Sorsogon City and Matnog town in Sorsogon.

Triunfante, who also chairs the Bicol Integrated Reproductive Health Alliance, noted an increasing trend in the number of people vulnerable to STI.

“Victims are becoming younger. More youths are now engaging in prostitution than before, even males as young as 12, due to poverty,” she said.

But she added that government programs and policies were not leveling up to address the problem.

Nongovernment support is also limited, she said.

Midas has been working with local governments to come up with ordinances creating an AIDS council in the localities that will monitor the spread of the disease and will educate people on prevention.

“Once the RH bill is passed and signed into law, there will be more comprehensive reproductive health services for the people, which includes the proper management of STI cases and prevention,” Triunfante said.

She said that in her experiences at work, not all health offices in towns and cities had personnel trained in handling STI cases.

There is also a lack of social hygiene clinics equipped with enough facilities, she added.

The legislation, also known as House Bill No. 5043, requires government hospitals to include contraceptives in their supply purchases and would require mandatory reproductive health education in schools, which is both opposed by the Catholic Church.

It would also require local governments to employ enough midwives or attendants for a ratio of one for every 150 deliveries per year; to have an emergency obstetric care and maternal death review; and to provide mobile health care services. Ephraim Aguilar, Inquirer Southern Luzon