PANDEMIC SEEN BEHIND CAUTION ON HAVING KIDS

THE job losses, business closures and the overall uncertainty created by the pandemic may have discouraged Filipino couples from having children in the past year, according to the Commission on Population and Development (Popcom).

In a virtual briefing of the Philippine Press Institute on Wednesday, Population and Development Undersecretary Dr. Juan A. Perez III said precovid-19, having a child would take up as much as a third of a couple’s savings, if they had any. If not, they would tend to borrow this amount.

Perez told the Businessmirror this cost, which only computes the cost of having a newborn, likely increased due to the pandemic. Buying personal protective equipment will already cost P500 each.

“That study was done precovid and referred to a newborn member of the family. That has not been updated,” Perez said. “The issue may be whether such savings still exist or may have been used up because of joblessness/underemployment during Covid.”

Perez said another issue that could come into play is the increase in the cost of living in recent years. Between 2018 and 2021, the cost of living nationwide increased by 15 percent.

However, the increase was not uniform. In some regions, Perez said, it was higher at 25 percent (Region 3 or Central Luzon), but only 4 percent in others (Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao or BARMM).

This, he said, could see the cost of having a newborn to slightly increase or remain the same at a third of a couple’s savings, depending on where the couple resides.

“Yes, [there could be] a slight increase. Health costs may have also gone up independently due to the need for testing and PPES,” Perez told the Businessmirror.

Apart from the cost of bringing new life into the world, housing remains a concern, particularly during the pandemic. Perez said the average size of homes in the country is 20 square meters.

This makes it difficult to encourage couples to have children. The small living spaces are already an issue in terms of maintaining social distancing and more so, if there is another person or child added to the household.

Fear of virus

FOR St. Luke’s Medical Center Psychiatrist Bernadette Monteclaro Manalo, the fear of contracting the virus also discouraged Filipinos from being intimate.

She said the pandemic “kills

the mood” as the health protocols and other routines that Filipinos need to do before entering their homes to prevent their families from contracting the virus are cumbersome.

Manalo said the pandemic has also “killed the spontaneity” of being intimate. She said during the pre-covid times, it was possible for couples to just go to a nearby motel or hotel to be intimate.

But these days, there are protocols and planning is often involved to follow these health SOPS. This makes it difficult to go on spontaneous dates with significant others.

Popcom earlier said the Philippine population is expected to achieve a historic record-low growth in 2021, as the total number of Filipinos is projected to increase by only 324,000 for the entire year—just a 0.3-percent increase compared to 2020.

This annual “natural increase” is the lowest since the period between 1946 and 1947, when the population grew by 254,000. As such, Filipinos will number 109.99 million at the end of 2021—lower by 2 million than earlier projections based on a 1.63-percent population growth rate (PGR).

Popcom also noted that the natural increase in population in 2020 was 914,797 with reference to PSA’S vital statistics, which placed the population at the end of 2020 at 109,667,216. The natural increase in population that year was 0.79 percent.