The constitutional provision that “[the State] shall protect the life of the mother and the life of the unborn child equally from the moment of conception” was drafted by the Constitutional Commission, which drafted the Charter with the intention of providing constitutional protection for the prohibition of abortion, although the promulgation of a more definitive provision sanctioning the prohibition was unsuccessful. The provision is one of several state policies that are generally considered unenforceable in law in the absence of implementing legislation. The 1987 Constitution also contains several other provisions that list various State policies. [Note 1] Whether these provisions in themselves can be the source of enforceable rights without implementing legislation has been the subject of heated debate in the legal field and in the Supreme Court. [Note 2] The Centre is working with a number of stakeholders to strengthen the legal framework and ensure women`s and girls` access to post-abortion care in the Philippines. According to several national laws and guidelines, women have the right to post-abortion care. However, due to the country`s restrictive abortion laws, the right to high-quality, humane, compassionate and non-judgmental post-abortion care has been continually violated. Jacob is also worried about the consequences after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Roe v Wade and overturned decades of access to safe abortions for millions of women across America. “If this happens in the United States and [anti-choice activists] see that it`s possible – that you could overturn an established law – it could only encourage and encourage them to do the same in other countries as well.

A 1997 study estimated that in 1994, despite legal restrictions, there were 400,000 abortions performed illegally in the Philippines and 80,000 hospitalizations of women due to abortion-related complications; [3] In 2005, it was reported that official estimates at the time ranged from 400,000 to 500,000 and increased, and that the World Health Organization (WHO) estimate was 800,000. Seventy percent of unwanted pregnancies in the Philippines end in abortion, according to the WHO. In 2005, about four out of five abortions in the Philippines were for economic reasons, often when one woman already has several children and cannot care for another. [4] According to a 2004 national survey of women of childbearing age, those who have had abortions are similar to Filipino women as a whole: they are typically Catholic, married, mothers, and have at least a high school diploma.4 The most common reason why women have had abortions – cited by nearly three in four – was the inability to pay the cost of raising an additional child or child. More than half of those who had an abortion reported having the procedure because they felt they already had enough children or that their pregnancy had arrived too soon after their last birth. Nearly a third of women felt that their pregnancy would put their health at risk, and another third believed that their partner or another family member did not want or support the pregnancy. Perhaps most troublingly, 13% of women who had an abortion cited pregnancy as a result of forced sex as the reason for an abortion. “These regulations have only led to a silent epidemic of unsafe abortions that have claimed the lives of so many Filipino women,” said Senator Risa Hontiveros, the country`s new opposition leader. It is not surprising that a greater proportion of poor women than their non-poor counterparts cited economic reasons for abortion, and about two-thirds of women who had abortions were poor.4 women under the age of 25, who accounted for 46% of abortion attempts in the 2004 survey, They also cited reasons related to their age – they wanted to avoid interrupting their school years, had problems with their partner or thought they were too young to have a baby. Among all the women surveyed, economic reasons and the fact that they are not married or too young were cited as the main reasons why women have abortions, showing that many Filipino women who have not had an abortion understand why other women choose to have an abortion.21 It is difficult for women to seek legal responsibility for such abuse.

since there are no recourse mechanisms and attempting to do so would expose them to the risk of prosecution. because they initiated an illegal abortion. But the most relevant example might be a country whose religious and political history is closely linked to the United States. In the Philippines, a former American colony, abortion has been completely banned for more than a century. Philippine law provides for prison sentences of up to six years for abortions and for anyone who assists in the proceedings. Arrests and convictions of women and abortion providers are widely reported in the local media, and UN committees repeatedly note that the abortion ban disproportionately harms socio-economically disadvantaged women and members of other vulnerable groups. In practice, abortion is allowed in cases where the life of the pregnant person is in danger, but no law explicitly states this. Some doctors trained in the Philippines secretly offer safe abortions in clinics and risk their careers because they believe women should have the right to ensure their own well-being. But these clandestine procedures are prohibitive, ranging from $56 to $225 for medical abortions in the first trimester and $188 to $470 for surgical abortions, and are becoming increasingly expensive in the second and third trimesters and in case of complications, according to an investigative report by digital media platform Rappler.