The Unseen Cost Of Philippines' Pandemic Baby Boom | Undercover Asia | CNA Documentary

over the last two years the pandemics brought the philippines to a standstill it's battered a once-surging economy left millions locked up for months and it's fueled a boom in unintended pregnancies during the course of 2020 we saw between 40 to 60 000 birds among [Music] with the health care service stretched paper thin this search brings hidden dangers what's the true cost of the rise in unwanted pregnancies in the philippines and who pays the price for this pandemic baby boom the church of black nazarene in manila women once left aborted fetuses in front of the church doors in the hope of saving their innocent child's soul but ironically just by these doorsteps is what's known as abortion market bitter concoctions and herbs promising to induce abortions are sold openly but that's not all that's available we send someone in undercover okay within minutes our undercover plant is sold a pack of pills [Music] in 2009 the philippines food and drug administration banned the purchase and use of misoprostol it's a drug used to induce abortion but near the church of black nazarene abortion pills are traded covertly and since the start of the pandemic business has never been better for women unable to venture outside for abortion pills social media is providing an easy solution [Music] since the pandemic started there's been a spike in online sellers advertising door-to-door deliveries [Music] and if the pills aren't enough massages from helots or traditional midwives offer a final shot at abortion marika works covertly helping women end their pregnancies foreign mmm okay [Music] [Music] 34 year old hershey gonzalez lives in happy land it's one of the most densely populated and impoverished slums in manila [Music] after the birth of their eighth child baby eliza hershey and her husband leonardo decided they must stop [Music] [Music] not [Music] after her last birth hershey relied on oral contraceptive pills but a box of 28 pills sells for 14 us dollars that's double what leonardo can earn in a day fortunately hershey gets a free supply of three boxes from village health workers every three months [Music] but in early 2020 everything changed upon further study of worldwide trends and measures at the need of extreme caution during such time as this i have come to the conclusion that stricter measures are necessary i am placing the entire maintenance of the sun under quarantine until april 2020 no march 2020 bonus to counter the viral spread the philippines began one of the world's strictest lockdowns all movement was restricted as guards patrolled the suite businesses shuttered medical centers ran reduced services public transportation ground to a halt and workers stayed at home manila became a ghost town being a family planning reproductive health cleaning all of our services were affected impacted by the lockdown one of the challenges was of course finding transportation because our clinics do not have their own vehicles they rely on public transportation our clients cannot avail of their monthly resupply for example appeals or those who are using injectables they have to access those services from our clinics regularly so during the lockdown they cannot just access those services so some of them have to stop using contraceptives that they used to get this is metro manila eight months after the lockdown health centers across the country were finally able to provide family planning information and services to communities they could once again conduct house-to-house visits and fulfill resupply requests for various forms of birth control but over 15 months during the pandemic such services were derailed the lockdown might have reduced the spread of covet 19 but it blocked the mobility of these healthcare providers and their clients likewise women who needed these services couldn't make their way to the health centers many women saw their birth control supplies run dry people stay at home especially during this pandemic they will really be very sexual they will exercise their sexual activities more often if a husband and wife cannot even afford buying a condom and they do a lot of sexual activities to pass the time or out of boredom chances are that the woman may get pregnant lockdowns were 100 all over the country for nine and a half months from march to december of 2020 in a survey that we did 60 to 70 percent of women their major problem during the pandemic was unplanned pregnancies an extra 214 000 unintended babies were born in 2021 all over the philippines that's an increase of 13 from the year before these children were born in a nation already overwhelmed by 1.5 million births a year thirty-three-year-old mafia harupai is determined to battle the pandemic's threat to family planning [Music] huh the moment restrictions were eased mafia applied for a special pass she spent the next five months delivering free birth control to a local community [Music] all the pills were donated by private companies foreign [Music] having no access to contraception can have tragic consequences foreign um [Music] it's illegal for teenagers to buy contraceptives from drugstores without parental consent prior to the pandemic teenagers could still get contraceptives from either government health centers or from community health workers these sources which generally come with contraceptive counselling don't require parental consent but with the disruption in these services marjorie supply dried up and now at the tender age of just 15 margaery is the mother of a four-month-old baby margaery represents a chronic problem in the philippines that's been exacerbated by covet 19 lockdowns in 2020 it's estimated that 18 thousand teenagers ended up getting pregnant due to the reduction of family planning services during the community quarantine [Music] the lockdowns meant schools shuttered for over 600 days and education programs were put on hold while learning moved online teenagers like marjorie found themselves with more time on their hands it is very risky for this teenage adults and mothers because most of them are at risk of having anemia sometimes with gestational diabetes preeclampsia or hypertension and for those of infants they tend to have a low birth weight mentally will make them depressed especially taking care of a young infant they sometimes commit suicide and sometimes it's not only themselves that are in danger they also try to kill the infant because it's deemed a burden to them there are two types of boots computer a hard boot is when the power is completely up to the system in question and the starting the machine since giving birth marjorie juggled schoolwork with taking care of a four-month-old daughter [Music] an artist the burden of caring for the child is so great many times you don't have support you don't have parent support it's a very heavy job of actually rearing a baby it means that a lot of young people are dropping out from school and once you drop out it's hard to get back the internal demands of parenthood at that very young age is so great that even if you have that enabling community around your teachers probably your friends etc it's difficult difficult foreign but in order for marjorie to continue schooling jersen the father of a baby had to drop out of is only 17 years old and he tries to make money with odd jobs [Music] the country already has the second highest teen pregnancy rate in southeast asia it's estimated that during the pandemic teenage pregnancies rose by almost 22 percent inadequate sex education and the lack of access to birth control coupled with no school and spending more time around their peers led to a surge in unprotected teen sex the philippine education department had planned to launch a new sex education curriculum but the rollout was derailed by covet 19. [Music] if a lot of our young people get pregnant early and they get stuck in child-rearing child bearing our economy will really be affected because we will not be able to have more stable income or profit from our employment industry during the course of 2020 we probably saw between 40 to 60 000 birds among my norse the problem there is if you cannot get a family planning method it's a 10 percent chance for these adolescents to get pregnant again for decades the philippines have struggled with rapid population growth its population more than doubled since the 1980s up to 1980 the philippine population was similar in size to thailand but 40 years on it is now at least a third larger than its asean neighbor access to birth control has always been a complicated issue in the philippines for years advocates and lawmakers struggled to pass a law promoting the use of modern contraceptives however the church and like-minded opponents stalled its legislation reverend father jerome ceciliano is one of the leading voices against the law to promote the use of contraceptives the teaching of the catholic church is only about natural family planning so when we see artificial methods we view this as against the natural process of procreation the artificial methods of family planning are also not 100 effective even those using condoms for example turned out to be pregnant even those using pills also turned out to be pregnant the church's stand on birth control held sway for many years in the catholic majority country [Music] but in 2017 all legal roadblocks were finally lifted even long-term contraceptions including hormonal implants and iuds could be given out free to everyone all of this is part of the responsible parenthood and reproductive health act or rprh which is envisioned as a means to slow the nation's population growth the major impact of the rprh law is that it has made it a policy that the philippine government the state will provide universal access to family planning and other reproductive health services at the start of the implementation of the law there were four million filipino women using modern family planning methods by the end of 2020 it had doubled to 8 million [Music] but the pandemic struck and all the hard-earned gains were suddenly in danger of being wiped out now that restrictions have eased mafia has been distributing birth control pills to four villages [Music] [Music] m despite the offer of an interuterine device or iud free of charge hershey decided against getting one this after her friend warned her about the risk of developing ovarian cysts from iuds [Music] hershey plans to rely on government-sponsored stocks of contraceptive pills despite not knowing if there will be regular deliveries as and when there are lockdowns for some women backstreet abortionists are heaven-sent desperation and ignorance force women to put their faith and their lives in the hands of those they barely know [Music] hmm [Music] in the philippines all abortions are illegal and in this staunchly catholic nation it's also widely seen as a sin but driven underground backstreet abortions remain as popular as ever after months of lockdown with her husband and no access to contraception mary jane has been left with an unwanted pregnancy she feels her only way out is to rely on marika to help her abort according to one study for every month in community quarantine induced abortion cases are likely to soar by an additional 17 000. [Music] it is mary jane takes a handful of pills from the midwife marika these are cytotec they're abortion pills containing the banned drug misoprostol after the drug is consumed marika will administer pincer strokes on mary jane's belly these will crush the three-month-old fetus foreign after a few minutes mary jane starts to bleed foreign [Music] [Applause] later mary jane's friend will help her bury her three-month-old fetus in a shallow grave near her house [Music] induced abortions in the time of pandemic basically it boils down to poverty of course for sex sometimes incest rape for those who don't have access to post-abortion care it's very dangerous for these women these women who had illegal abortions usually can have hemorrhage their uterus might be taken out unnecessarily because of the infection or worse due to hemorrhage they can die of the illegal abortion done on them for those who have no means for an illegal abortion there is another option sell the baby in the philippines unborn or newborn babies are being traded under the guise of adoption social media is rife with posts from expectant moms looking to give up their baby and couples looking to adopt [Music] undercover asia puts up a plea on facebook to appeal for a baby to adopt within a week we have two responses from so-called bee moms or birth mothers [Music] we arranged to meet one of them she's six months pregnant but already prepared to sell her child foreign [Music] [Music] prior to pandemic illegal adoption has been really rampant but during this time illegal adoption has been through online basically it's easier it's more accessible and it's faster the department of social welfare and development or dswd implements the country's adoption system but since 2020 the dswd has received just four complaints of illegal child trafficking we do not have the real numbers of those cases of illegal adoption there could be many cases but it's just that it's not reported to us [Music] social media usually pedals unborn babies when it comes to buying babies already born manny is the man to go to he's a middleman matching childless couples with poor families who have infants to sell manny organizes deals including the price time of exchange and the fixing of paperwork since the start of 2020 manny has sold over seven babies on the black market foreign through another middleman like manny undercover asia is introduced to a mother who's looking to sell her newborn the 47 year old called herself nancy permanente foreign nancy lives with a mother who makes just three dollars a day working as a garbage collector [Music] the price on her baby would amount to three months of their household income nancy became pregnant during the lockdown endless covet 19 lockdowns kept nancy away from vital sexual reproduction health services [Music] foreign official adoption in the philippines is a complex process that takes years pandemic travel bans court closures and stay-at-home orders for government workers have made the process even harder birth mothers desperate for money or unable to add yet another child to their brood resort to desperate measures regardless of the consequences it could be physical adoption it could be sexual adoption because there was no assessment done thorough assessment done to really ensure that these adoptive parents are really fit to take care of the child and to provide for that child there is the tendency that this children who were illegally adopted may also be abused [Music] [Music] 14 days after undercover asia spoke to nancy she finds a buyer for her baby they're a childless couple from manila she's paid 196 u.s dollars and the baby broker takes a 20 commission [Music] on [Music] unwanted pregnancies aren't just burdening poor families in the philippines they're also putting a strain on a healthcare system that's already stretched to the limit by the pandemic [Music] um as a result of covet 19 lockdowns 34 year old hershey gonzalez has spent 19 months in confinement with her unemployed husband with no regular access to birth control hershey is now expecting her ninth baby [Music] and [Music] m i think the trend in the number of pregnancies will continue we are expecting more women to be getting pregnant because the environment is conducive for reproduction and we will be handling a lot of pregnant women out of the lockdown dr jose fabelier memorial hospital is one of the world's busiest maternity wards this manila hospital is known as the baby factory before the pandemic more than 2 000 babies were delivered here every month but when covert 19 hit about a third of the maternity wards were shuttered midwives gynecologists and nurses were diverted to the front line to battle the surging number of covet 19 cases starting january we are supposed to open up but the omicron no barian came in and we are again on a limited capacity mode if it is already full in our maternity ward they can no longer refer high-risk pregnancies to our hospital because there's no more space [Music] with limited or no access to maternity wards during the pandemic it's a perfect storm for impoverished women like hershey for those who have more than five children they are usually at risk of having hemorrhage after birth because near uterus is overworked and these women having nine or more they are usually under nourished most of them have anemia have diabetes hypertension they also run the risk of having low birth weight babies premature babies there is our numerous but not wanting to jostle with others at maternity hospitals hershey is opting for a home birth foreign 19 has swung a wrecking ball into the philippines family planning services it is likely to buck the philippines decade-long decline in birth rate with an expected surge in pregnancies after the pandemic [Music] hershey welcomed her ninth baby into the world [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] it's been two weeks since mary jane had a risky illegal abortion while she survived the abortion and escaped the economic consequences of an unwanted child the abortion left an emotional imprint which he could not erase [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] you

Channel: CNA Insider

Views: 526,582

Keywords: CNA, CNA Insider, Channel NewsAsia, People stories, Asian perspectives, Asia news, Southeast Asia, philippines, teen pregnancy, abortion, family planning, pandemic, unplanned pregnancy, birth control, contraceptive, illegal adoption

Id: FJGLJKtYFIU

Length: 46min 31sec (2791 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 19 2022