ISLAMABAD: Complications during pregnancy take on average 14,000 women’s lives every year. But the deaths can be avoided through promotion of birth spacing, prevention of unwanted pregnancies, and expanding availability of family planning services and deliveries by skilled birth attendants.

This was said by the officials of the Population Council, an international non-governamental organisation (INGO), at a briefing they arranged for the parliamentarians at a local hotel.

Chairman Senate Mian Raza Rabbani could not turn up at the briefing but his written message was read out there.

The Senate chairman said that it was a most encouraging reflection of the sincerity and maturity of all major political parties that they had given due importance to the subject of family planning in their respective manifestos for the previous general election of 2013.

“There is already a sound and solid basis on which a multi-party consensus can be shaped and applied,” he was quoted as saying.

“We cannot afford a single day’s delay in extending and improving access to family planning services, especially for those millions of married couples who already wish to practice family planning,” he said.

Minister of National Health Services Saira Afzal Tarar said the government was concerned about the maternal and infant mortality rate.

She claimed that the government gave importance to improving the health care of mothers and children. She, however, admitted that the subjects of family planning and balanced population growth could not be given the highest priority at the government level during the past 68 years.

The deputy representative and officer in-charge, the United Nations Population Fund, formerly the United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA), Ms Sarah Masale said the UNFPA was committed to supporting Pakistan’s efforts.

Earlier, the country director, Population Council, Dr Zeba Sathar said governments should give more attention to population welfare.

“Other major Muslim nations such as Iran, Turkey, Indonesia, Malaysia and Bangladesh have achieved far better standards of family planning practices and reduced the mortality rates of mother and infants compared to Pakistan,” she said.

Former Senator Javed Jabbar was the moderator of the event.

Published in Dawn, September 20th, 2015

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