The Reproductive Health bill has some provisions that are similar with those in other laws, but it is the bill’s provision on giving the poor access to contraceptives that makes it unique, Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago said Tuesday. Santiago said this during the ongoing Senate debate on the controversial RH bill in reaction to her colleague, Sen. Vicente Sotto III, who called the proposed measure redundant in relation to other similar laws. Santiago explained that it is “really the nature of legislation" to repeat provisions from other laws to consolidate and emphasize these. “All other bills are reflections of all prior bills," she said.
Section 7 of RH bill Section 7. Access to Family Planning All accredited health facilities shall provide a full range of modern family planning methods, except in specialty hospitals which may render such services on optional basis. For poor patients, such services shall be fully covered by PhilHealth Insurance and/or government financial assistance on a no balance billing. After the use of any PhilHealth benefit involving childbirth and all other pregnancy-related services, if the beneficiary wishes to space or prevent her next pregnancy, PhilHealth shall pay for the full cost of family planning. But the senator, who was also a law professor, pointed out that Section 7 of the RH bill, which tackles the need to give the poor access to modern family-planning methods, sets it apart from other existing laws. She said this provision cannot be found in any other piece of legislation. “Take out Section 7, you don’t have an RH bill," she said. “This is the crux of the bill." “Some people don’t want hospitals to tell the poor the full range of modern family-planning methods… Why is there so much heated debate about giving information to a person?" Santiago added.
Sotto: ‘Redundant’ bill Earlier during Tuesday’s debate, Sotto pointed out the supposed redundancy of the RH bill by saying that laws seeking to prevent sexually transmitted diseases, for example, are already in place in the Philippines. Sotto said these are Republic Act (RA) 9710 or the Magna Carta for Women, and RA 8504 or the Philippine AIDS Prevention and Control Act of 1998. Responding to Sotto, Sen. Pia Cayetano, however, pointed out that the RH bill will be a “special law" that governs all aspects of reproductive health. “It would be absurd to exclude HIV and other transmissible diseases simply because there are other laws on the measure. Otherwise, this would not be as comprehensive a bill as it is meant to be," Cayetano said. The debate was ongoing as of posting time.
— KBK, GMA News 
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