Rwandan Minister of Health, Diane Gashumba on Friday received an international award, one of the highest recognitions for “foreign experts who have made outstanding contributions to the nation, in accelerating access to postpartum family planning in health facilities.
Postpartum family planning is conducted by countries through the prevention of unintended pregnancy and closely spaced pregnancies through the first 12 months following childbirth.
It said the new approach increases family planning use by reaching couples with family planning methods and messages around and after the time of birth and saves lives by promoting healthy timing and spacing of pregnancies, which is associated with decreased maternal, infant and child mortality.
Latest estimates indicate that the availability of health care professionals has improved.
In 2011 there were 625 doctors and 8,513 nurses/midwives working in Rwanda which corresponds to a ratio of 1 doctor per 15,428 inhabitants, 1 midwife per 23,364 inhabitants, and 1 nurse per 1,138 inhabitants.
It said the situation has improved particularly for midwives, when the ratio was nearly 66,749 inhabitants per midwife, according to the latest Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) conducted in 2015
On the sideline of the fifth International Conference on Family Planning (ICFP) taking place in Kigali three major donors including Canada, the United Kingdom (UK) and Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation committed the resources to fund family planning services in the world.
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, whose Institute for Population and Reproductive Health co-hosted the family planning summit in Kigali together with the government of Rwanda, announced a $18-million fund that will be managed under the United Nations Population Fund (UNPFA)
As for the UK government, it announced that, through its Department for International Development (DfID), it will invest over £200 million (approximately $260 million) in a new flagship programme called Women’s Integrated Sexual Health (WISH).
In addition, Marie-Claude Bibeau, Minister of International Development of Canada, announced up to $104.4 million ($78.8 million) in funding for projects that take a comprehensive approach to sexual and reproductive health and rights around the world.APA-Rwanda
The Express News
