Spillover effects of too many people

Around 78 per cent of deliveries carried out in homes are supervised by inexperienced and untrained midwives, participants were told at a seminar on Friday. As a result, three out of eight babies die during or immediately after delivery.

The seminar on population and development was organised by the Sindh population welfare department in collaboration with the Dow Medical University, UNFPA, the population ministry and the Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI). It was held at the Dow University of Health Sciences.

Panelists discussed the deteriorating conditions under which women give birth, which lead to problems and complications in deliveries and are hazardous for the health of both mother and child.

Speakers included DG Private Public Sector Partnership Ministry of Population Mian Mauzam Shah, President KCCI Haji Abdul Mohammad Hadi, Dr Shahnaz Ghazi and Dr Razaur-Rahman.

They stressed the importance of women's and children's health, urging that all measures to ensure their health and safety should be guaranteed.

"The government cannot deal with the population crises alone," said one of the speakers, "The private sector has to come forward."

Additional secretary of the medical PWD, Sindh, gave a briefing on one of the government's projects. He said that the PPSO project on population control was launched in 2006 and under the project, the Sindh government built 38 centres across the province. These centres were set up in the offices of different institutions, including the Social Security Hospital, PIA, Sindh police, Pakistan Air Force and navy.

Panelists also discussed how the exponential increase in population was affecting health, education, employment and infrastructure.

Topics related to population should be added to the school curriculum so that students can learn about the negative impact of the 'population bomb' in a developing  country such as Pakistan.

The speakers also underlined the need for educating people and holding awareness campaigns so that people can realise the significance of birth spacing, which is essential for their health.

According to the vice-chancellor of the Dow Medical University, Dr Masood Hameed, an online course on reproductive health will soon be initiated in collaboration with the population ministry for 6,000 students in the university. These students are expected to then take forward these teachings on population growth among the people.

This collaboration and constitution of public, private and academics will prove to be an asset for the community and will produce positive results, he added.

His views were shared by Haji Abdul Mohammad Hadi, who said that this kind of cooperation is an essential requirement these days.

The seminar was attended by doctors from Hyderabad, Peshawar, Karachi and other cities and by officials of the Sindh Population Welfare Department.

A memorandum of understanding (MoU) was also signed between Dow and the population ministry, under which they plan to work on reducing the maternity and infant mortality rates in the country.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 26^th, 2010.