"rapid population growth and high fertility rates, especially among the poor, do exacerbate poverty

and make it harder for the government to address it", while at the same time clarifying that it would
be "extreme" to view "population growth as the principal cause of poverty that would justify the
government resorting to draconian and coercive measures to deal with the problem (e.g., denial of
basic services and subsidies to families with more than two children)". They illustrate the connection
between rapid population growth and poverty by comparing the economic growth and population
growth rates of Thailand, Indonesia, and the Philippines, wherein the first two grew more rapidly than
the Philippines due to lower population growth rates.[10] They stressed that "the experience from
across Asia indicates that a population policy cum government-funded [family planning] program has
been a critical complement to sound economic policy and poverty reduction".[9]
In Population and Poverty, Aniceto Orbeta, Jr., showed that poverty incidence is higher among big
families: 57.3% of Filipino families with seven children are in poverty while only 23.8% of families
who have two children live below the poverty threshold.[12]

Proponents argue that smaller families and wider birth intervals resulting from the use of
contraceptives allow families to invest more in each child’s education, health, nutrition and eventually
reduce poverty and hunger at the household level.[9] At the national level, fertility reduction cuts the
cost of social services with fewer people attending school or seeking medical care and as demand
eases for housing, transportation, jobs, water, food, and other natural resources.[5][10][24] The Asian
Development Bank in 2004 also listed a large population as one of the major causes of poverty in
the country, together with weak macroeconomic management, employment issues, an
underperforming agricultural sector and an unfinished land reform agenda, governance issues
including corruption.[11]

Maternal deaths in the Philippines, according to the World Health Organization, is at 5.7 per
day,[29] not 10–11 deaths a day, as per the proponents who repeated these numbers "to drive home
the point".[30][31]
The proponents state that the passage of the RH Bill would mean:

 Access to information on natural and modern family planning

 Improvement of maternal, infant, and child health and nutrition
 Promotion of breast feeding
 Prevention of abortion and management of post-abortion complications
 Improvement of adolescent and youth health
 Prevention and management of reproductive tract infections, HIV/AIDS and other STDs
 Elimination of violence against women
 Counseling on sexuality and sexual and reproductive health
 Treatment of breast and reproductive tract cancers
 Male involvement and participation in reproductive health issues
 Prevention and treatment of infertility
 Reproductive health education for the youth
The Department of Health states that family planning can reduce maternal mortality by about
32%.[13] The bill is "meant to prevent maternal deaths related to pregnancy and childbirth", said Clara
Padilla of Engender Rights. She reported that every day, "there are 11 women dying while giving
birth in the Philippines. These preventable deaths could have been avoided if more Filipino women
have access to reproductive health information and healthcare".[citation needed]
The key to solving maternal deaths, according to the Senate Policy Brief on reproductive health, is
the establishment of birthing centers.[5]
The Philippine Medical Association (PMA) stated in their Position Paper that the goal of reducing the
rise of maternal and child deaths "could be attained by improving maternal and child health care
without the necessity of distributing contraceptives. The millions of funds intended for the
contraceptive devices may just well be applied in improving the skills of our health workers in
reducing maternal and child mortality in the Philippines".[32]
The UP School of Economics argues, in contrast, that there is lack of access especially for
poor people, because contraceptive use is extremely low among them and "among the
poorest families, 22% of married women of reproductive age express a desire to avoid
pregnancies but are still not using any family planning method".[9]They say that lack of
access leads to a number of serious problems which demand attention: (1) "too many and
too closely-spaced children raises the risk of illness and premature deaths (for mother and
child alike)," (2) "the health risks associated with mistimed and unwanted pregnancies are
higher for adolescent mothers, as they are more likely to have complications during labor,"
(3) women who have mistimed pregnancies are "constrained to rely more on public education
and health services and other publicly provided goods and services", further complicating
limited public resources, (4) families are not able to achieve their desired family size. Thus
the UP economists "strongly and unequivocally support" the thrust of the bill to enable
"couples and individuals to decide freely and responsibly the number and spacing of their
children and to have the information and means to carry out their decisions”.[9] Proponents
argue that government-funded access is the key to breaking the inter-generational poverty
that many people are trapped in.[9][24] Abortifacient issue[edit]
According to the RH bill, one of its components is "prevention of abortion and management of post-
abortion complications". It provides that "the government shall ensure that all women needing care
for post-abortion complications shall be treated and counseled in a humane, non-judgmental and
compassionate manner". It also states that "abortion remains a crime and is punishable", as the
Constitution declares that “the State shall equally protect the life of the mother and the life of the
unborn from conception”.[36]
The position of the Philippine Medical Association (PMA) "is founded strongly on the principle that
'life or conception begins at fertilization' at that moment where there is fusion or union of the sperm
and the egg and thus a human person or human being already does exist at the moment of
fertilization". The PMA condemns abortifacients that "destroys the fertilized egg or the embryo" and
"abhors any procedure...or medication that will interrupt any stage of fertilization and prevents its
normal, physiological, uninterrupted growth to adulthood".[32]
Jo Imbong, founder of the Abay Pamilya Foundation, reported that "Lagman said in a House hearing
that the bill would protect human life 'from implantation' ",[37] and not from fertilization, noting at the
same time that the Records of the Constitutional Commission state that “Human life begins at
fertilization”.[37][38]

Contraception and abortion relationship[edit]

Proponents argue that research by the Guttmacher Institute, involved in advancing international
reproductive health, reveals that the use of contraceptives can reduce abortion rates by 85%.
Proponents such as 14 Ateneo de Manila University professors, argued thus: "Studies show that the
majority of women who go for an abortion are married or in a consensual union (91%), the mother of
three or more children (57%), and poor (68%) (Juarez, Cabigon, and Singh 2005). For these women,
terminating a pregnancy is an anguished choice they make in the face of severe constraints. When
women who had attempted an abortion were asked their reasons for doing so, their top three
responses were: they could not afford the economic cost of raising another child (72%); their
pregnancy occurred too soon after the last one (57%); and they already have enough children
(54%). One in ten women (13%) who had attempted an abortion revealed that this was because her
pregnancy resulted from forced sex (ibid.). Thus, for these women, abortion has become a family
planning method, in the absence of information on and access to any reliable means to prevent an
unplanned and unwanted pregnancy".[24]
The bill, said Clara Padilla of EnGender Rights Inc, will "help reduce the number of abortions by
providing increased access to information and services on modern contraceptive methods, that in
turn will reduce the number of unwanted—and often aborted—pregnancies".[39]
Both sides of the debate accuse the other side of deception and misleading the public. The pro-RH
people accuse the anti-RH group of misleading the public by calling the bill an abortion bill, when the
bill states that abortion remains a crime and is punishable. The anti-RH advocates accuse the RH
supporters of hiding from the public the international population control agenda which includes
abortion and they refer to U.S. Secretary Hillary Clinton who said that RH includes abortion.
The RH bill provides for "prevention and treatment of HIV/AIDS and other, STIs/STDs", especially
since the number of HIV cases among the young nearly tripled from 41 in 2007 to 110 in
2008.[39] Proponents emphasized that RH will help in stemming the AIDS epidemic that is worsening
in the Philippines. Lagman explained that "Globally, the new number of reported cases of HIV
infections and deaths has dropped by nearly 20 percent. It is therefore both ironic and tragic that the
Philippines’ trajectory is towards the other direction. Our country’s HIV/AIDS statistics have
increased by 30 percent!"[45] Primary among the means is distribution of condoms. The proponents
applauded government efforts last February 2010 when it distributed condoms in some areas of
Manila.