Remove abortifacient drugs from market, CBCP urges government

The government should remove abortifacient drugs and devices — including contraceptives — from the market, the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) said yesterday.

Novaliches Bishop Teodoro Bacani urged the Arroyo administration to take abortifacients off the market, even as he demanded that the government release a study made during the Ramos administration that proves the Church’s claim that contraceptives are actually abortifacient drugs.

"The government should come out with the study. We had that study made under the Ramos administration. They did not release the findings to the public," Bacani said at a press conference held after their 86th Plenary Assembly last Monday. "That should already make you suspicious."

He also urged the government to make a list of those drugs that "prevent the fertilized ovum from lodging in the wall of the uterus, or, having lodged there, displaces the fertilized ovum."

Bacani said that if contraceptives have this mechanism, the CBCP is asking for a full disclosure on this class of drugs from the government.

The Novaliches bishop said that when the Church asked for the results of the study, they were not given. He claimed to have managed to edit a copy of the study, but it was worded in very technical language.

Bacani’s statement on contraceptives was part of the CBCP’s discussion during their plenary assembly.

He said a resolution was filed by one bishop regarding his concerns on population control, and this was quickly approved.

"The essence is that (the bishops) would want the propagation of responsible parenthood, but they don’t want population control through contraception, sterilization and abortion. I think there is a balance in the position of the CBCP on this matter," Bacani said.

He noted that the government’s proposal of a door-to-door dissemination of birth control information is a duty of the government, and that the bishops cannot stop them from doing it.

However, Bacani urged the government to explain the "action of contraceptives" to the public.

"Many of the contraceptives are not contraceptives only, but are in fact abortifacients. The reason is that contraceptives do not only prevent conception but they prevent the fertilized ovum from lodging in the wall of the uterus. That we consider already as abortion," he said, noting that many of these are "silent abortions" caused by "hidden abortifacients."

Bacani also said the intra-uterine device (IUD) is an abortifacient. He asked to have the study – which said that contraceptives and IUDs are abortifacients – interpreted by a medical practitioner, and the doctor explained that the IUD deliberately prevents the fertilized egg from attaching itself to the uterine lining.

He added that he hopes President Arroyo will abide by the principles of the Catholic church.

"This is not the first time she said this. I remember just after she was installed as President, she said that she would be acting according to Catholic principles," Bacani said.

CBCP president and Cotabato bishop Orlando Quevedo, on the other hand, urged married couples to use the natural method of family planning instead of contraceptives and abortifacients. The method, he said, is much misunderstood even by educated lay people.

"They believe that the natural family planning method that the Church advocates is the old ‘Russian roulette,’ like trial and error," Quevedo said.

He noted that there are advances in science that can determine, more or less, the regularity of a woman’s cycle and thus make using the natural method of family planning more feasible.