penalizing home births as being discriminatory to IP women. During the course of the
fact finding and public hearing, the Commission has counted at the minimum twelve
(12)ordinances all over the country which penalize home births.
Lack of access to RH services and facilities and Denial of RH services
Accessibility of RH services and information has been highlighted throughout the fact
finding and public hearings particularly with women with disabilities, Moro and
Indigenous Women and women in GIDA.
In the NCR and Cagayan de Oro-Bukidnon cluster, the lack of accessibility of
government health centers and facilities for women with disabilities have been
raised. Submissions and sworn testimonies of PWDS complain of the seeming
invisibility of the needs of PWDs, the absence of facilities like examination tables, the
absence of interpreters in police stations and in courts for PWD victim-survivor of
violence against women, and the absence of interpreters as well in health centers and
government health facilities. PWDs complain of not being informed of the processes
affecting them and of the disregard for their decision because of their disability. A
submission also recounted the denial of health services on the basis of her disability,
another, the denial of Philhealth benefits on account of chronic illness, clear accounts
of discrimination which compounded by the women’s already marginalized status.
Violence Against Women
In case of violence, the Fact Finding and Public Hearing has shown that many women,
particularly those from the marginalized sector suffer and are vulnerable from
violence at various levels: in the family, in the community, and in the hands of
institutions. In several cases, while information is available on the remedies in cases
of VAW, women are faced with issues of access, lack of sensitivity of the duty bearers
and the lack of understanding of the multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination
experienced by women from the marginalized sector.
In the NCR and in the submissions from the PDRC highlights the prevalence of gender
based violence against deaf women and the hands of family members, neighbors and
members of the Community and the absence of interpreters in the government
agencies tasked to respond to the violence. The absence of interpreters, the lack of
access crucial to deaf women’s access to remedies, are by themselves institutional
violence. Other forms of institutional and systemic violence include the ‘invisibility’
of the concerns of deaf women, women with mental disabilities and other disabilities
in accessing remedies in cases of VAW.
Also in NCR, women who are informal settlers in Tondo also provided an account of
the violence they experience – at the hands of intimate partners, from their own
neighbors, and form the State in cases of demolition. Their case highlights not only
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