ISLAMABAD: Couples who intend to get married should acquire knowledge about maternal health and better family planning.

This was highlighted by Shehzad Roy on Wednesday. Mr Roy, who is the goodwill ambassador of Population and Family Planning, was speaking at a consultative meeting to discuss and finalise the content of an online reproductive health course for young adults, called Bakhabar Noujawan at Health Services Academy, Islamabad.

“It is important that couples intending to get married attend and learn from the online course for better understanding maternal health, about spacing between births, and contraceptives. There are a significant number of couples who wish to plan their families but have little knowledge of how to go about it. In fact, if this course can be made compulsory, it would go a long way to manage population in Pakistan,” said Mr Roy.

The Ministry of National Health Services and National Committee for Maternal and Neonatal Health (NCMNH), in collaboration with Association for Mothers and Newborns (AMAN) and Health Services Academy (HSA) organised the event, where Mr Roy informed participants that 18,984 children were born in Pakistan every day.

In 2018, a suo motu notice on the alarming level of population growth was taken by the Supreme Court under a human rights case. Council of Common Interest (CCI) was requested to look into the recommendations made by a task force and develop a plan of action. Among the eight approved recommendations, one was to include pre-marital counselling on family planning as mandatory for registration of nikah (marriage).

The ministry along with NCMNH and AMAN undertook the task of developing the course for young adults on a learning management system (LMS). This is a platform for young adults to learn factual, evidence-based information on various aspects of life, which they encounter as a part of growing up and while transitioning from an adolescent to a mature responsible adult, whether they are married or not.

Participants learnt that the objective was to empower youth between 15 to 29 years to make informed decisions for their health and well-being and become responsible members of the community. The course could also be taken by people with limited literacy who did not have a computer, but could navigate a smart phone. This online course is in English at present and would later be available in Urdu and other regional languages.

On successful completion of the course, participants would be enabled to print self-generated course certificates from the learning portal.

Speakers proposed that each certificate would have a unique serial number, which may be validated through the web portal. The same serial number may be added as mandatory information required in the marriage registration application form of National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra). Once the certificate serial number had been verified from the web accessible database, the marriage registration process would continue and marriage certificates would be issued.

Director general (population wing) Dr Sabina Durrani, chairman of Nadra Tariq Malik, Federal Secretary Education Aamir Khawaja were among the panellists. The event was attended by key government officials from provinces, stakeholders from academic institutions, and many partners.

Published in Dawn, February 16th, 2023