(SPOT.ph) Children are one of the most vulnerable members of our society. In the Philippines alone, a 2015 study by the Council for the Welfare of Children and UNICEF found that two in three children experienced physical violence, one in four children experienced sexual violence, and two in five experienced psychological violence—take note, those were just the recorded cases. Who knows what the actual numbers, including unreported ones, could really be? Child protection laws and safety nets are weak to non-existent in our country. Not to mention the lack of trained medical professionals and social workers; dedicated health facilities and services, too, are absent or inadequate.
This is why when someone like Dr. Bernadette J. Madrid, a pediatrician who has devoted her career to ensuring the problem of violence against children of any form is seen and fully addressed, becomes a Ramon Magsaysay awardee, it pays to at least read about her story.
The global announcement of this year's awardees was held on August 31, the birth anniversary of the late Philippine President whose ideals inspired the award's creation in 1957. The formal conferment is scheduled on November 30 at the Ramon Magsaysay Center in Manila City.
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Meet the Pinay doctor on the 2022 Ramon Magsaysay Awards Foundation list, Dr. Bernadette Madrid:
Born in Iloilo, Dr. Bernadette Madrid studied medicine and pediatrics at the University of the Philippines Manila. She then did a post-residency fellowship in ambulatory pediatrics at Montefiore Medical Center in New York City. It was during this fellowship that she encountered the medical center's Child Abuse Program, which opened her eyes to a problem that she and other Filipino doctors at the time did not often see—despite it being a prevalent reality in the Philippines.
In 1997, Madrid served as head of the Philippine General Hospital Child Protection Unit, the first such facility in the country. She would spend the next twenty-five years pursuing an active, multifaceted career that would put her at the helm of what has been praised as "the best medical system for abused children in Southeast Asia." A one-stop health facility, Philippine General Hospital Child Protection Unit (PGH-CPU), provides a coordinated program of medical, legal, social, and mental health services for abused children and their families. It served 27,639 children as of 2021.
The PGH-CPU has since become the axis of a national network of child protection units. The Child Protection Network Foundation, Inc., a civil society, academe, and government partnership, was established in 2002. As the Child Protection Network (CPN) executive director, Madrid designed programs and engaged with family courts, schools, hospitals, local government units, community organizations, and policymakers in advancing the cause of child protection.
Further expanding her cause, the Network of Women and Child Protection Units was formed in partnership with UP Manila, PGH-CPU, CPN, the Department of Health, local government units, and the private sector. The network now consists of 123 Women and Child Protection Units (WCPUs) in 61 provinces and 10 cities, which have served 119,965 children and adolescents and 30,912 women. The network has a total staff of 237 physicians, 199 social workers, and 85 police officers. As head of CPN, Madrid oversees and coordinates the network's five areas of work: medical and psychosocial care, child safety and legal protection, a national program for training in child protection, a nationwide network of WCPUs, and research for a national database on child abuse.
Madrid's work requires her to wear several hats at once. Every day she is a doctor, educator, researcher, social leader, organizer, and advocate. To quote Madrid on how she perseveres despite challenges, she says "I feel that I was prepared to do this work. I was given the talent to do this and it has developed as I worked. That’s why I’m happy. It has become, for me, work that is God’s work."
Dr. Bernadette Madrid is known not only in the Philippines but in other parts of Asia as well. Not only is she known for leading and running a multisectoral and multidisciplinary approach to child protection but also for her unwavering devotion and compassion in seeing that every abused child finds a place that is safe, nurturing, and healing in society.
The Ramon Magsaysay Award is one of Asia's premier prizes and highest honor which recognizes the greatness of spirit shown in selfless service to the peoples of Asia. For over six decades, the award has been given to 344 outstanding individuals and organizations whose noble service has offered their societies, Asia, and the world, successful solutions to some of the most intractable human development problems.
Other awardees of the 64th Ramon Magsaysay Awards include Sotheara Chhim, a Cambodian psychiatrist and mental health advocate who has been healing his fellow citizens' unique trauma; Tadashi Hattori, a Japanese ophthalmologist and humanitarian who has committed his time and resources to provide free eye surgeries in Vietnam; and, Gary Bencheghib, a Frenchman on the mission to eradicate marine plastic pollution in Bali, Indonesia one river at a time.
For more information about the Ramon Magsaysay Awards, visit the Ramon Magsaysay Awards Foundation's website.