Birth control advised in Guinea-Bissau

More and more women are starting to use contraceptives in Guinea-Bissau, as access to women’s health services and child healthcare improves and family planning messages start to sink in, say health officials. Now 98 of 114 health centres in the Western African country offer family planning services and 10 per cent of women use contraception said the United Nations. That figure is still very low compared with the rest of the world. But in tropical Guinea-Bissau, one of the poorest nations on earth, with only a handful of ambulances, next to no medical equipment and few fully-functioning maternity wards, it is a great step forward, said the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) adviser to the Ministry of Health.

In Guinea-Bissau, one in 13 women dies in pregnancy or childbirth, according to the UN - one of the highest rates in the world. About 1,100 out of every 100,000 live births in the country spells a death sentence for the mother, making it one of the world’s deadliest places to be pregnant or have a baby. Simply giving women access to modern contraception methods could prevent 40 per cent of maternal deaths worldwide. UNFPA helps pay for free contraception nationwide, trains health workers on family planning and reproductive health and advises the Health Ministry. Health workers speak to teenagers in schools about the dangers of starting a family too young and suggest contraception options to women arriving in the country’s hospitals. “Women want family planning here - we meet with very little resistance to our messages,” said hospital director Inghala Na Uaie. But because stocks are so inconsistent, the hospital cannot guarantee contraception to all who want it, he told The United Nations news service. “Five children is enough,” mother Dada Saar, 36, told the news service while waiting to receive her next contraceptive implant at a hospital in Bissau. “We don’t have enough money to support them. My husband has no fixed job. Even if one of my children were to die, I wouldn’t want more.”

Florence de Silva, 28, has one daughter and wants another child, but plans to stop at two. “Otherwise I will not be able to educate them,” she said. Even if I have just two and they are both educated, they will be able to look after me when I am older.” Economics play a central part in getting women to use contraception, say health officials. If it is free, the uptake is good and also while the government is committed to family planning, because the country has so many other problems, there is always something else that takes a higher priority. According to figures out last year there were only about 12 doctors per 100,000 persons in the country. The rate of HIV-infection among the adult population is above 10 %. And life expectancy at birth between both sexes was at below 50.

By Hayley Jarvis for SOS Children