Erap health chief urges GMA to reconsider policy vs contraceptives

Former Health Secretary Alberto Romualdez said Tuesday that the national government should reconsider its policy against purchasing contraceptives in view of the scheduled total phase out of the contraceptives being donated by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) next year.

In an interview after the 4th Usapang POPDEV Forum yesterday, Romualdez noted that the Philippines is not yet prepared for the final pull out of USAID donations and this could spell disaster for the Filipino people.

“As I see it, the reproductive health situation is so bad. The gap between the top 20 percent of the population that can afford (family planning) services and the lowest 20 percent that don’t have access to these services is very big,” claimed Romualdez, who is also vice president of the Forum for Family Planning and Development Inc.

Romualdez added that while USAID had informed the Philippines that it was gradually reducing its contraceptive donation in 1998, the country has not prepared enough.

“It seems we are acknowledging the phase out just now. We had 10 years to prepare for that. The response has been a little delayed. In fact, the response has been done mainly on the prodding of foreign (agencies),” he said.

USAID has been donating some P300 million worth of contraceptives for 30 years before it announced the reduction. The agency had apparently realized that the country was relying to much on its donations in managing the population. – Sheila Crisostomo