And Your Point Is?

A Condensed Essay on the RH

Contents
That you should know: The Exordium Rates and Figures Science Facts Denouement Conclusio

That you should know: The Exordium

The Responsible Parenthood, Reproductive Health and Population and Development Act of 2011, more commonly known as the RH Billone of the noisiest issues ever to bombard the Filipino nation and family. Quite vociferous in their attacks, proponents of the Bill have caught the attention of so many through exposure in the popular media, with all their publicity schemes. However, there are a lot of things these RH people wouldnt want us to know about; and we have a right to these not so insignificant details. Of each of thesethe few I have chosen to presentwe shall speak in turn. And with this in mind, lets get to the other side of the argument.

Firstly, the RH Bill does not address the roots of poverty, and merely emphasizes on limiting our numbers. For many of us yet to know, overpopulation of our country is but a myth! We are not overpopulated. (In fact, a good deal of land falls into disuse, lying idle and in wait.) The thing is, its Manila thats overpopulated. All those shops, stores, buildings, businesses, hospitals and universitiesthese are what entice people to set out and stay there, even permanently. And the plain reason for such a decided move would be that everything is there. This is evidenced by the ever increasing influx of students, workers and professionals alike to the capital, to where there is supposed greater opportunity in acquiring a better life. Thus, Manila becomes the convergence point of many local populations, and is undoubtedly liable to lead to some sort of overcrowding and congestion. (And this goes down to a case in point: The national government is primarily based in the city of Manila; that being so, state officials are apt to equate Manila, crowded as it is, with the rest of the countrywhich of course is certainly erroneous.) The same is true with other major cities, with prevalence of the selfsame Life there must surely be better, mentality. So in effect, the whole population of a region (supposedly) can be concentrated in only a few points within the area.

And in the end, sadly, its the poor, hapless, ill-supported rural folk who are hardest hitmany of them leaving what they know to be home but eventually ending up among the city slum-dwellers.

And it is precisely because of these warren lands and ghetto conditions that advocates of the RH Bill find another excuse: They contend that State-imposed artificial birth control practices will solve the poverty experienced by majority of the 94 million Filipinos. They want to reduce the weak and dependent, a gambit plan that altogether seems rather far-fetched.

Taking the underscored of these radical ideas one by one, there is first this question: Why blame the dependents? Based on the latest available data of the WHO, the Philippines ranks #75 out of 166 nations in terms of dependency ratio: For every 100 working people, an additional 66 are being cared for, and thats not bad at all!considering this includes children and the elderly. In fact even, were very close to the WHOs weighted average of 66.3; were very much normal, so theres no reason to kill babies just to bring that figure down!

Now with that taken care of, lets turn our attention this time to the second alibi, the problem of poverty. Suppose we have a poor, but nevertheless sensible man. If asked to choose, he would certainly prefer a regular job even over much foodmuch less a condom. Its a job or livelihood that the poor need, not pills that could kill! (Ill explain this later.) Yet little do these lawmakers know (if not actually just pretending they dont know) that the need for job opportunities can be met, and the industries perked up, by investors here in our country, both local and foreign. Unfortunately, however, corruption is not that good for business, and many investors stay away from us because of our notoriety for such folly. And so you ask: Why, then, is there corruption? Why are people corrupt? And the answer is relatively simple: Because they covetously desire those of others, because they center on self over others. But why is that? In the end all this points to one thing: a serious MALFORMATION OF VIRTUES. Consequently; we can say, and we will say that this is still very much a moral issuewith no need for further diagnosis. So you see, the culprit up to now is never overpopulation, which again does not exist, but mismanagement the unfair distribution and allocation of resources (be it natural, physical or human), as well as job opportunity, education, et cetera.

Rates and figures

Furthermore, why do we even need such a bill when our population is already bound to go down? In terms of fertility rate, the Philippines ranks #62 with 3.23 for 2005-2010, down from 3.54 (20002005), according to the United Nations World Population Prospects; and only figured at 3.2 as stated in the September 2011 issue of National Geographic, with the Population Reference Bureau as source.

Below are statistics that yet illustrate the Bills apparent basis on flawed data on population growth rates and fertility levels: For the purpose of being clear and lucid (and to avoid a numerical overload on your part, or that of your brains), I have decided to present it as a line graph for your eyes to rest on, hopefully.

Average Number of Children per Filipina in Her Lifetime

8 7 6 5

4
3 2 1 0 1960 1980 no. of children 2000 Replacement Level 2020

Aside from this, our countrys population growth rate has declined since the Year 2000 census of 2.36%; the UN states it at only 1.8% for 2005-2010. Whats more, with only 1.5 children per woman on the average, East Asian economic tigers (especially Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and even China!) are facing a real dilemma. Very low fertility is leading to an aging population with fewer working-age people to support it, a problem now facing Europe and North America according still to National Geographic. Also, Brazils family size even dropped sharply in the absence of any official government policy promoting birth control.

The RH Bill ignores the negative impact on the economy and society of an ageing population. Take Russia, for instance; where the old outnumber the young, and as you walk through Muscovite streets, all you meet are people stricken in years. Now the Russian workforce is ageing, and the economy is limping. Thus the state had to resort to bringing foreign workers into the country, notably from China, to fill the many gaps within the labor ranks. Now it would be interesting to know that 20 years ago, Russia implemented its own birth control program as well. And only recently, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin announced the governments plan to spend 3.3 billion pounds, just to encourage Russian families to have more children! Its ironic. You spend a lot to bring the population down, then you spend some more to bring it up againsuch a waste of sweat-money. And with this controversial Bill pending in Congress, we are trying to repeat what they did two decades ago. And unfortunately, we dont have 3.3 billion pounds (or the peso equivalent) to give away just like that. Consequently, the obviously little that we have should instead be used to finance more feasible programs: additional classrooms, for example; or maybe even the K to 12 program that the governments trying so hard to push lately.

Science facts
Apart from the Bills impracticality which we discussed a while ago is this little catalogue, compiled from research that various experts and organizations around the world had conducted. Lets take a look at these rather surprising studies

1. The pill kills humans, both mother and child.

We well know how this ends with the childhuman life, after all, begins at fertilization. But what about the mother? At worst, shell fall victim to these: 3.9 to 4 times the chance of acquiring heart disease. -University of Udine 1.9 times the likelihood to die from cerebrovascular disease, 2.5 times from cervical cancer. -British Medical Journal 20-30% INCREASE in atherosclerotic plaque that may cause buildup in your arteries correlated to every 10 years of oral contraceptive use. -University of Kent in Belgium

10% INCREASED RISK in cervical cancer if the woman is taking the pill for five years or less, 60% INCREASED RISK of developing cervical cancer if the woman is taking the pill for five to nine years use, 100% GREATER RISK if taken for at least 10 years. -UKs Epidemiology Unit in Oxford The HIGHEST LEVEL of carcinogenicity, the same as cigarettes and asbestos, A cause of stroke, and significantly increases the risk of heart attacks. -The International Agency for Research on Cancer in 2007

2. Wide use of contraceptives leads to the destruction of families.

more premarital sex, more fatherless children, more single mothers, more poverty, more abortions a decline and downgrading of marriage, less domesticated men, disrespect for ones spouse, usually the wife more crimes, according to the studies of Nobel prize winner in economics, George Akerlof.1 3. Condoms promote the spread of AIDS. Other major science journals have confirmed this. Availability of condoms makes people take wilder sexual risks, thus worsening the spread of the disease. Green said that what works is fidelity to ones spouse.2 Harvard Director for AIDS Prevention, Edward C. Green This actually happened in Thailand and Africa, wherein condoms were procured to supposedly lower the infection rate, but instead yielded the exact opposite. 4. The RH Bills are based on wrong economics. Is there a correlation between population growth and economic development? No clear association is the answer of Simon Kuznets, Nobel Prize winner in the science of economics.3 Many later studies confirmed this.

Akerlof, Yellent and Katz (1996), "An Analysis on Out-of-Wedlock Childbearing in the United States", Quarterly Journal of Economics (The MIT Press) 111 (2): 277317; Akerlof, Men Without Children, The Economic Journal 108 (1998)
2 3

Green (2003) Rethinking AIDS Prevention. Praeger.Also: Lancet, Science and BMJ Kuznets (1974) Population Capital and Growth, Norton.

Is population control one of the ingredients for high economic growth? No, population control is not among the five ingredients found by the 2008 Commission on Growth and Development headed by Nobel prize in economics winner Michael Spence. The growth factors are: governance, openness to knowledge, stable finances, market allocation, investment and savings.4 Our country loses 300 billion pesos to corruption every year. These are only a number of reasons why the Catholic Church opposes the Bills passage. Evermore, the Church is not there to impose, but to stand by what is already there.

Denouement
And a final point: If ever the Malthusian Theory is desperately brought up by the pro-RH lobby, I have two words. But before that, in case youre not familiar, this theory says that we either have to decrease the birth rate or increase the death rate so that population (which increases geometrically) will not catch up with subsistence (which increases arithmetically). However, as proven and demonstrated by many historical refutations of Malthus dire prophecies, this matter is but a question of utilizing human ingenuitytechnologyin order to maximize production in a sustainable fashion, and now the two words, SUSTAINABLE DEVEOPMENT.5 And this is very much possible given the modern humans advanced technology and innate problem-solving capabilities.

Conclusio
Thence population is not issue, so why drain our coffers, to limit it artificially and with all those packaged risks?

The Growth Commission (2008) The Growth Report: Strategies for Sustained Growth and Inclusive Development, World Bank Publication. Ann Wolfram, Population, Resources and Environment: A Survey of the Debate