The advance of AIDS in the Philippines has been "low and slow", but birth control ideology could unleash a full-blown epidemic.
by Oliver M. Tuazon and Angelo S. Porciuncula
(March 5, 2012)
While the Philippine Senate is busy with the impeachment trial of the Chief Justice of the Philippine Judiciary, the House of Representatives has resumed its interpellations on the controversial Reproductive Health Bill (HB 4244). President Benigno Aquino III is a known supporter of the bill, which has caused worry in some quarters that he will ask his allies in the lower house to fast-track its passage as he did with the impeachment of the Chief Justice. The Speaker of the House is a member of the Philippine Legislative Council for Population and Development, one of the most active groups lobbying for its passage.
The RH bill is entitled “An Act Providing for a Comprehensive Policy on Responsible Parenthood, Reproductive Health and Population Development and for Other Purposes.” However, let’s be clear that the Philippines is not a desert when it comes to birth control devices and services. In recent months, as condom ads flooded the streets and consciousness of Philippine society, it has become clear to everyone that the marketing and use of contraceptives in the Philippines is already legal and that the RH debate is actually about the use of government funds to promote and supply condoms, pills, injections, IUDs, sterilization procedures and so on to all and sundry.
This would, above all, complete a cultural revolution that began in 1967 when former President Marcos signed up to an international agreement on population control, a concept that the West has successfully imposed on many other developing nations. In conjunction with other social changes such as urbanisation, indigenous sexual and family culture has been undermined in these countries and new health threats have arisen, which lends doubt as to its genuine concern for “(reproductive) health”.
This is nowhere more evident than in the HIV/AIDS epidemic that has swept sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Asia while condom has been king. It is on this phenomenon that we now wish to concentrate as it demonstrates a compelling practical reason for rejecting the cultural package that the RH bill represents. The following is part of a longer paper that includes a wider review of the scientific evidence about condoms and AIDS.
