MANILA, Philippines?Stepping up the fight against abortion, a party-list representative has filed a bill in Congress imposing harsher penalties on members of the medical profession caught performing the illegal act, as well as on those who sell abortifacients.

Alliance for Rural Concerns party-list Rep. Narciso Santiago said doctors, nurses, midwives and other health workers who perform or assist in abortions should be permanently stripped of their licenses, apart from being sent to prison as prescribed by law.

Currently, the Revised Penal Code imposes a penalty of from 12 to 20 years in prison for medical professionals who intentionally cause an abortion. Women who intentionally undergo an abortion are penalized with a prison term of from six months to six years.

Santiago?s measure would remove the criminal liability of women who undergo an abortion if they testify against the health professional who performed the procedure on them.

The bill would also impose a longer prison term on those who dispense abortifacients, or substances that induce abortion.

Under the Revised Penal Code, pharmacists who dispense abortifacients without a proper prescription face imprisonment of from one to six months and a maximum fine of P1,000.

Under Santiago?s bill, the penalty would be increased to from six months to six years in prison and the maximum fine would be raised to P20,000. Leila B. Salaverra