New health law to address new technology, social change

New health law to address new technology, social change

Debbie A. Lubis, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The government and the House of Representatives, along with the
Coalition for a Healthy Indonesia are drafting a health bill
which will serve as a grand regulation that accommodates social,
political, scientific and technological changes.

Minister of Health Achmad Sujudi said that the bill would be
designed to replace the current Law No. 23/1992 on Health and
National Health System, which contains some contradictory
articles.

"We hope the bill can serve as an umbrella act for all
regulations dealing with health matters, especially in the era of
decentralization," health minister Achmad Sujudi told The Jakarta
Post.

He said the draft would provide guidelines for regional
administrations to draw up bylaws on health care for people from
all walks of life.

Sujudi was speaking on the sidelines of a two-day seminar on
the draft jointly organized by The Indonesian Forum of
Parliamentarians on Population and Development (IFPPD), the
House's Commission VII overseeing population and welfare affairs,
the Coalition for a Healthy Indonesia, and the Center of
Information Study and Training (PPPI) on Thursday.

Commission VII, in its paper stated that the draft was needed
to anticipate the impacts of new technology such as cloning, stem
cell research, genetic engineering, and other things related to
human health.

The current law only regulates technology for transplantation,
transfusions, in-vitro fertilization, plastic surgery and
implants.

Sanoesi Tambunan, chairman of Commission VII, said at the
seminar that unlike the current law, the draft approached health
as a part of human rights that should be honored.

Article 2 of the draft reads: "The Government shall guarantee
that there is no discrimination against race, ethnicity,
religion, spiritual beliefs, culture, gender, age, education,
kinds of jobs, social status, political ideology, place of
residence or sexual orientation of people who seek health care
for themselves."

Sanoesi added that the draft also regulated reproductive
health which was overlooked by the current health law.

"Reproductive health is not merely women's matters nor a
matter of pregnancy and birth. It also deals with health
reproductive organs, reproductive functions and the reproductive
process," he said.

Article 57 of the draft emphasizes that people have the right
to decide on their own sexual lifestyles and women are free to
determine their own reproductive activity which is healthy, safe
and free from coercion or violence.

Sanoesi said that a ban on abortion in the 1992 law was not
effective in preventing illegal abortions because in actuality,
some 30 percent of the maternal mortality rate (MMR) was caused
by these.

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) reported that the
country's MMR was 390 in every 100,000 live births.

Article 60 of the draft will give the government more
authority with regard to specific issues to prevent unqualified,
unsafe and irresponsible abortions.

An abortion is considered unqualified, unsafe or irresponsible
-- and therefore banned under the new law -- if it is conducted:
(a) by coercion or without the pregnant women's consent; (b) by
unlicensed medical workers; (c) without the existing profession's
standards, or (d) discriminating and merely based on the women'
ability to pay the expenses, ignoring their safety, the draft
says.

Illegal and unsafe abortions can cause severe bleeding and
infection, trauma to a woman's reproductive organs or death.

"Let's not see the ruling from a black and white point of
view. It is for the sake of women's health, to protect them from
severe complications caused by illegal and unsafe abortions,"
Sanoesi said.

Only abortions for clear medical problems are allowed under
Indonesian law.