Solon: Use P400M to hire doctors, not to buy condoms and pills

Instead of spending P400 million to purchase condoms and birth control pills, the government should use it to hire 3,000 doctors, a lawmaker said on Thursday. Zambales Rep. Ma Milagros Magsaysay said rechanelling the “birth control devices fund" to the hiring of doctors “would yield more benefits and serve the public interest more" than using it to purchase contraceptives. At a Senate budget hearing on Wednesday, Department of Health (DOH) Secretary Enrique Ona said P400 million of its budget for 2011 would be used to purchase birth control pills, injectables, condoms, and cycle beads. The DOH also plans to employ 136 part-time and 10 full-time doctors with the rank of Medical Specialist II next year at a cost of P18.7 million. “Thus, for P400 million, we can hire 2,897 part-time medical specialists and 213 full-time medical specialists . At this number, we can deploy two of them per town or 34 of them in each of the top 90 public hospitals,“ Magsaysay said in a press statement. She said with only one government doctor for every 29,000 Filipinos “there is no doubt that doctor shortage is one problem area in the health system that needs to be addressed." She added that in the order of priorities, doctors “clearly come ahead of condoms and pills." “If you assess their importance, there is no contest between the two. Doctors win hands down over condoms , “ Magsaysay said. She reiterated her call that the P1 billion fund for “family health including family planning" in next year’s DoH budget be subject to a condition that will prevent its disbursement for the purchase of artificial birth control devices, a position also aired by Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile on Wednesday. “There should be some form of a budgetary contraceptive in the form of a provision in the General Appropriations Act that will prevent the DOH from using the money for a shopping spree for bills and condoms, “ the lawmaker said. Magsaysay earlier warned that with the remote possibility of Congress giving birth to a reproductive health bill, Malacañang “may just short-circuit the legislative process and take the administrative route" by ordering the mass distribution of contraceptives. “If Congress cannot give birth to an RH law, then President Noynoy (Aquino) can father an illegitimate offspring through administrative conception," she said. “With money authorized by Congress in the national budget , President Noynoy can just order the DOH to stock clinics with contraceptives and you have the de facto implementation of the RH law, “ she added. Meanwhile, Davao City Rep. Karlo Nograles said the government allocation of P400 million for condoms and other contraceptives only underscores his position that country does not need a law on Reproductive Health and family planning should continue to be a free and a democratic choice among Filipino couples. “Apart from confirming our suspicion that this RH hullabaloo is all about profit for our condom makers and contraceptive manufacturers, this decision of the Executive to allot millions to buy condoms and other contraceptives only makes more obvious what this government's preferred policy is on population management," he said. “Any RH measure that is passed will only put a legal and budgetary stamp on this preferred policy, that may prohibit us from questioning it later on. That is why I maintain the position that we do not need legislation for reproductive health," Nograles added. He said nothing in the country's existing laws and statutes prevents the government from buying millions worth of condoms and other contraceptives. Thus, it is unnecessary for Congress to craft a law that compels the government to do the same thing, he added. “Everything that is said and prescribed by the proposed law has been and is still is an executive prerogative and free of any legislative prescription. I don't see any legal or Constitutional impediment that prevents the administration from exercising its preferred population management policy," he said. –VVP, GMANews.TV