CEDAW/C/PHI/4 English Page 58 236. As an action response to the Beijing Platform for Action, the following are policy imperatives for health which will be the focus of implementation by the Department of Health of the Platform and which the Department has translated into concrete programmes and projects for implementation beginning in 1996: (a) Achieve the highest level of health throughout the life cycle; (b) Create an environment that will promote the attainment of the highest level of health throughout the life cycle; (c) Empower women to exercise their reproductive rights. 237. The gender and development focal point in the Department has been strengthened through the issuance of Department Order No. 200-A. The Order, which was directed to the heads of different services, mandates the coordination of gender-sensitivity orientation and trainings, integration of gender-related concerns into the planning and implementation of programmes/projects, into health education and into information, education and communication messages of the different programmes, and initiatives towards sex-disaggregation of health data. 238. The Office for Public Health Services was related programmes and services addressing the include the Family Planning Service, Nutrition and Control Program, Dental Health Service and Motherhood Program. created to administer all the needs of women. These services Service, National AIDS Prevention the Women's Health and Safe 239. While in 1989 the Commission on Population passed a Board resolution designating the Department of Health as the lead agency for the implementation of the family programme, this was superseded by the Local Government Code of 1992 which devolved most of the health care services to the local government units. 240. To make the programme more acceptable and to mobilize assistance from all possible sectors, the Department has revised the policy statements of the Philippine Family Planning Program as follows: (a) Rejection of abortion; (b) Improvement of family welfare, with the main focus on women's health, safe motherhood and child survival; (c) Freedom of choice; and promotion of family solidarity and responsible parenthood. 241. Other government initiatives enacted for the upliftment of women's health concerns are as follows: (a) Republic Act 7305 (1992), also known as the Magna Carta for Health Workers, allows public health couples to be employed or assigned in the same municipality; /...