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Virtually all health professionals agree that the most effective ways to control the population explosion are sex education that should start at a young age along with tubal ligation of women who desire it. Qualifications for ligation of indigent women have recently been revised nationwide from women with four children to women with two children, and the requirement that it needs the husband’s signature approval has been eliminated. Thousands of women in municipalities throughout the country are therefore seeking assistance with ligation.

Increasing the percentage of women of reproductive age who avail themselves of the often tight supply of contraceptives such as pills and injectables and are thereby learning to space their babies are additional ways of effective family planning. While birth control pills are distributed free of charge and are generally available, contraceptive injectables that last for three months have to be purchased by the municipal health centers and provided by midwives with service costs added. This greatly limits their use by indigents as they cannot afford to buy them.

It is an effective Family Planning Visual Guide book for doctors and nurses produced by the Philippine Department of Health with technical assistance from the John Hopkins University and funding support from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).