Pro-RH groups appeal SC ruling voiding law’s key provisions

MANILA, Philippines - Several religious groups supporting the Reproductive Health (RH) law have appealed the Supreme Court (SC) ruling earlier this month that voided key provisions in the controversial law.

In a 30-page motion filed on Monday afternoon, the groups led by the Filipino Catholic Voices for Reproductive Health Inc. and Interfaith Partnership for the Filipino Catholic Promotion of Responsible Parenthood asked the high court to reconsider its ruling declaring unconstitutional eight provisions in the RH law.

The groups, who stand as intervenors-respondents in the case, conceded to the claim of petitioners and anti-RH groups that the SC ruling has rendered the law toothless as it struck down key penal provisions.

They argued that the penal provisions should be restored as “a deterrent to prevent any further acts of human rights violation.”

“If the penalties are there, all healthcare service providers and government officials have to do is to comply and they would not be criminally liable,” they stressed.

The intervenors also questioned the majority opinion of the SC justices that the penal provisions violate the constitutional freedom of religion.

For instance, the SC voided portions of section 7 of the law, which require private hospitals owned by religious groups to refer patients to other health facilities and allow minors who suffered miscarriage to access modern family planning methods without the consent of parents.

The groups argued that the ruling would allow “violation of minor adolescent girls’ reproductive health rights” and would be “also detrimental to the work of medical providers in decreasing and halting HIV (human immunodeficiency virus) transmissions.”

The high court also voided provisions in Section 23 penalizing health workers who fail or refuse to disseminate information on RH programs regardless of religious beliefs, healthcare providers who refuse to refer non-emergency patients to another facility regardless of religious beliefs, health workers who require parental consent from minors in non-emergency cases, and public officials who refuse to support RH programs regardless of religion.

But the intervenors argued that this ruling could lead to “human rights violations and shatter the whole principle behind the necessity of the medical profession and the rationale of an effective and responsive public health system.”

The groups also lamented that the SC ruling is discriminatory against women. “It disregards women’s right to decide on their own bodies. This perpetuates subordination of women, patriarchy and male domination where our Philippine society has provided a license to healthcare service providers to violate women’s rights with impunity.”

Lastly, they questioned why the SC equated the ovum with the fetus in its ruling.

“With all due respect, equating the ovum with the fetus is contrary to established and definitive medical and scientific findings and even findings of comparative jurisprudence,” they reiterated.

With these grounds, they asked the SC to reconsider its ruling on the voided provisions of the RH law.