Sen. Sotto and the RH bill

Senate Majority Floor Leader Vicente Sotto III vehemently expressed his fight against the RH bill for personal and divine reasons in the media on Aug. 13, 2012.

As a private practitioner in obstetrics/gynecology, I viewed with deep concern the negative implication of Sen. Sotto’s tuno en contra speech to the non-medical public. He blamed the contraceptive pills that failed to prevent his wife Mrs. Helen Gamboa-Sotto, from getting pregnant resulting in a congenitally defective son that had a weak heart requiring daily blood transfusion until his death at five months.

A review of articles on the oral contraceptive pills did not reveal increased risk of developing congenital malformations in the offspring. The registered failure rate is less than one percent. In my observation, women get pregnant while taking the pills because they self-medicated, occasionally failed to take the pill regularly every night. Once they skipped one dose, escape ovulation may have occurred and may lead to an unwanted pregnancy due to incorrect taking of the contraceptive.

There is also a window of two weeks wherein patient s taking oral contraceptive pills are advised not to have unprotected sex and use other methods because it takes that long before the pills can prevent ovulation and pregnancy.

Being a colleague of the late Dr. Carmen Enverga Santos at the Makati Medical Center, alleged obstetrician of Mrs. Helen Gamboa-Sotto, I can vouch that the doctor adequately advised her patient the correct procedure of using the pills after giving her a thorough informed consent.

On several occasions that I was invited in many hearings in Congress, I have emphasized the safety, effectivity and reliability of contraceptive pills when taken correctly.

I condole and sympathize with Sen. Sotto in his sad memory of his late son. Hopefully, he would recover his composure and shed off his personal biases at the time an objective appraisal and decision on the RH bill will be necessary, where reason must prevail over emotions in addressing legislation.