'Kitchen knife caesarian' shows need for RH bill, lawmaker says

Manila, Philippines - The “kitchen knife caesarean,” the exodus of the country’s health personnel, and the increasing annual maternal deaths is a “collage depicting the grotesque picture” of the Filipino women’s poor health due to the lack of a reproductive health law and the administration’s neglect of public hospitals, a party-list lawmaker said yesterday.

Gabriela party-list Rep. Emmerenciana de Jesus was commenting on reports that a 28-year-old woman from Isabela province, “Jane,” performed a caesarean operation on herself using a kitchen knife last July 4 and took out the eight-month-old fetus from her womb.

The lawmaker was angry that charges would be filed against the woman, who would have not done what she did if there were enough public health facilities for those in her situation.

“A health care system that truly responds to the needs of women and their children, especially from marginalized families, should show a picture of women in the pink of health. Yet we bear witness to the story of ‘Jane’ who performed caesarean on herself using a kitchen knife, personifying a dying health ‘non-care’ in the country,” De Jesus said.

“Such is the grotesque picture of a health care system that is left in the hands and at the mercy of privatization where profit is the priority,” she added.

She said the corporatization of public hospitals, budget cuts in health services, and the exodus of health care professionals in a system that “is already too skewed in the lack of health personnel attending to our women patients – these are sure ways to kill women and children, especially those from the marginalized sectors.”

De Jesus said if the government is going to press charges against Jane for abortion, it should also look into the accountability of government agencies that are mandated to take care of women’s health and who have opted instead to abandon government responsibility and duty where public health care is concerned.

“Instead of abortion charges, Jane needs the help of the government. She is a victim of lack of support in many aspects,” she said.

Maternal deaths in the Philippines have reportedly almost doubled in the recent year. A report published by the Department of Science and Technology’s Science Education Institute in 2011 also highlighted that nurses and midwives represented the biggest group of professionals leaving the country for better opportunities abroad.