Director of the Family Division of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), Dr Patrick Aboagye has expressed the need for Ghana to do more to improve contraceptive growth rates in light of the increase in total fertility rates.
He noted that population growth, if unchecked, has implications for a country’s development, hence the need to increase the use of contraceptives to satisfy people’s demand for family planning services.
Dr Aboagye stated that the goal of the health sector is to increase the availability and access to quality family planning across the length and breadth of the country.
According to him Ghana has recorded 25% of contraceptive use as of 2017 among married couple, which, he lamented, indicates that Ghana is further away from achieving its targets for contraceptive prevalence that it otherwise would have been.
He also mentioned that there was compelling evidence that practicing family planning yields many health and socio-economic benefits by managing and slowing population growth, reducing exposure to unwanted pregnancies, preventing unsafe abortions and reducing maternal deaths.
Speaking at a project closure event in Accra, he said the Ghana Health Service is willing to partner with NGOs such as World Vision International to translate policy to actionable plans to promote family planning in the country.
The project, which was dubbed ‘Healthy Timing and Spacing of Pregnancies’ (HTSP), was implemented in Ghana over the past three years in the West Gonja District of Ghana by World Vision International, a Christian humanitarian International non-governmental organisation (INGO) with the aim to push for more women to adopt the use of contraceptives to enable them space their pregnancy and reduce maternal deaths.
The project had an objective of reducing maternal death and malnourishment among children by ensuring mothers regain their strength after childbirth through spacing of pregnancies and also increase contraceptive prevalence rate by 10% in the area.
The key model used in the project implementation was Channels of Hope (CoH) on maternal, newborn and child health with a focus on healthy timing and spacing of pregnancies.
CoH was used to empower faith leaders of various communities, both Christian and Islamic leaders, to engage their congregation and communities to support family planning and build the capacity of women on HTSP.
In his welcome address, the National Director of World Vision International, Dickens Thunde, said the United Nations Population Fund 2014 report indicates that the use of contraceptives could help reduce maternal mortality by 35%, cut abortion in developing countries by 70%, and lower infant mortality by 10 to 20% as stated in the family planning and US foreign policy 2011.
He added that the report on population says that over 2 million young women are not able to access reproductive health, leading to 70% of abortions in developing countries, stating that the full provision of modern contraceptives, combined with adequate care for all pregnant women in Africa, will lead to 73% drop in maternal deaths on the continent.
In the baseline survey conducted by World Vision Ghana in its operational areas in West Gonja and Zabzugu districts in 2016, it was revealed that the Contraception Prevalence Rate (CPR) for both West Gonja and Zabzugu was 21.3% and 9.2% respectively, which was less than the national average of 27%.
It is estimated that about 21,225 people were reached through the activities of these faith leaders and the Congregational Hope Action Team through their planned preaching of sermons in their congregation and community outreach programmes, he noted.
Given that, he was of the view that with collective collaboration and partnerships from all stakeholders, World Vision can champion the goals of HTSP to improve the wellbeing of mothers and children.
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