Maternal Healthcare: Slum Women Left to Fend For Themselves
Bangladesh has advanced to a moderate level in public health and maternal health care. Mothers to be are enjoying a considerable number of services and support during their pregnancies and post pregnancy. Yet negligence has been observed in cases of slum dwellers.
The health rights of the expectant mothers of the city slum are not ensured as needed. Their financial instability, health unawareness and government schemes, particularly for them leads to miscarriages and a rise in mortality rates. According to WHO guidelines, an expectant mother must visit a doctor eight times to reduce perinatal mortality while, expectant mothers of slums barely visit doctors as it is expensive in private clinics. Additionally, they prefer untrained midwives for home births. According to Bangladesh Urban Health Survey(BUHS), even though the delivery facility has been increased by 17% from 2013-2021, half of the slum mothers prefer to deliver at home.
A 2021 BUHS conducted by the National Institute of Population Research and Training showed that only 40% pregnant women in slums received over four antenatal care checkups. Dr Ferdousi Begum, president of the Obstetrics and Gynaecology Society of Bangladesh, stated ANCs ensure routine care for mothers and unborn children to detect problems, prevent maternal deaths and birth immaturities and prepare mothers for childbirth. Inadequate ANCs cause major complications, nutrition imbalance and delivery or family planning difficulties.
Maximum city slum expectant mothers lack in essential minerals, iron and folic acid, calcium carbonate and vitamin B supplements which resulted in the rates of children of city slums under-5 stunting rate is 34%, wasting 16%, underweight is 28%. In BUHS survey. Bangladesh Government Maternal and Child Health Training Centre provides free ANCs and prenatal vitamins but most women are unaware of it.
It is also observed that slum mothers were even excluded from the women and children affairs ministry’s programme titled “Maternity Allowance,” initiated in 2010-11, for poor and underprivileged pregnant women to meet their increased nutritional demands. Additionally, another ministry project — “Karmajibi Lactating Mother Sohayota Tohbil” — provided training and a Tk 800 monthly allowance to 2,77,000 underprivileged lactating mothers for three years. However, only 133 women in the Kalyanpur slum received the money.
Though both the programmes were later merged and renamed as “Ma O Shishu Sohayota Kormosuchi”. Under the programme, 7,740 poor expecting and lactating mothers from Dhaka South and North are expected to receive Tk 800 per month. But this number represents only 0.62 percent of the mothers in the capital’s urban areas compared to the total targeted beneficiaries (12,54,000).
Rubina Khan, the new director of the programme, said 12,43,000 BDT/- crore is the total allocation for the year which will be disbursed as allowances and beneficiaries can have it once their NID is verified. Though receiving money is going to be a month-long process.
Source: The Daily Star