TACLOBAN CITY – Couples’ choice is above all.

Thus said Health Secretary Manuel Dayrit when asked by the media why the health department is promoting both the use of contraceptives and natural family planning when it has drawn confusion among couples.

Dayrit told reporters during a news conference in the sidelines of the Salubungan program in this city yesterday that local health workers can promote both the artificial and natural method in population management.

“If couples are confused on the two advocates, they’ll be the ones to clarify and choose which to follow,” he stressed.

The highest health official in the country admitted that there’s a negative effect in the use of contraceptives as reported but such case is very isolated.

According to hi, a contraceptive use may cause a negative effect to one’s health but it is still up to the men or women to decide if they would endure what the health secretary tagged as “nature effect of the drugs or medicines.”

“This is a free country, we want people to act according to their own consciences,” Dayrit pointed out.

He added that though they are promoting natural methods, the government also creating opportunities for the people to have access to artificial methods.

‘The decision is up to the men and women,” he said.

Within the first quarter of the year, Dayrit told local reporters that they will push through massive information dissemination on how to mange the country’s growing population.

We’ll be going door-to-door campaign early next year on family planning services. We will make sure that Filipinos actually get a good education on how the body functions,” Dayrit said.

Earlier, some reproductive health advocates in the country had scored the national government for the absence of sound population policy.

Legislative measures are now being proposed to mange the ballooning population of the country which is one of the main roots of poverty and government’s in capability to deliver its basic services to very Filipinos.