Family planning award recognises efforts in the Philippines
Manila – In June, Population Services Pilipinas Incorporated (PSPI), through its team in Ozamiz, received an award for its long-standing efforts providing SRH and family planning services in the municipality of Glan in Saranggani Province on the island of Mindanao.
Only 38.6% of women of reproductive age use a modern family planning method in Glan, which has an estimated population of 103,000. The partnership between the municipality and the Marie Stopes Ozamiz team, which started in 1996, is a direct result of PSPI’s commitment to provide high quality, safe, effective, and muchneeded family planning services to citizens who live some distance from town centres. As a result, the Marie Stopes team travels hundreds of miles in order to reach this and many more municipalities desperately requiring services.
The recognition, which was awarded by Mayor Enrique B. Yap, Jr. during his State of the Municipality Address, is an acknowledgement of PSPI’s “invaluable and unsurpassed dedication . . . in providing bilateral tubal ligation and pap smear services …..for the betterment of our people and society”.
The population of the Philippines is distributed widely over the archipelago which can make reaching people very difficult. However, undaunted by such a challenge, PSPI overcomes barriers of distance and time to provide longacting and permanent contraceptive methods to women and men in as many as a thousand cities and municipalities around the country. This strong commitment to service delivery continues to save the lives of thousands of Filipino women each year.