Breakthroughs Today

THE Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR), a New York-based human rights group, released on July 14 a study entitled “Forsaken Lives: The Harmful Impact of the Philippine Criminal Abortion Ban” to provide an argument on their call to have abortion legalized in the country. The study mentioned the more frequently used unsafe abortion methods such "as hilot (abdominal massage), use of a catheter, and intake of a labor-inducing drug.” It argues that our anti-abortion laws “violate international law and major political commitments” in protecting women’s health and rights... ( Read more. ) This article appears in SunStar Cebu newspaper on 27 October 2010.

Exactly one month (31 days) after the Philippines reported its first H1N1 confirmed case on May 22, one Filipino citizen died from the flu. The Department of Health (DOH) announced on June 22 the death of Philippines' first victim of the worldwide pandemic swine flu virus H1N1. The victim was a 49-year-old female, resident of Sta. Rosa, Laguna, and a worker at the House of Representatives in Quezon City. She attended the seminar of the committee affairs department from June 15 to 16 in an unreported venue, and fell ill the following day. Her companion in the seminar also fell ill. Other attendees of that seminar can be reasonably considered infected too. She has also travelled to Kalinga together with officemates. She died on June 19 due to acute myocardial infarction, which is characterized by sudden chest pain, shortness of breath, nausea, vomiting, palpatations, and sweating. She displayed flu-like symptoms on June 17, two days before her death. Considering the incubation of aro