Maternal mortality must be an index for development of all countries to help improve the health of women and young girls, Professor Fred T. Sai, one of Ghana’s foremost reproductive health experts has said.
GNA/ Accra: Maternal mortality must be an index for development of all countries to help improve the health of women and young girls, Professor Fred T. Sai, one of Ghana’s foremost reproductive health experts has said. Prof. Sai said although maternal and infant health issues had improved after the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) 20 years ago, there is much more to be done to meet the target of the Millennium Development Goal 5 by 2015 and beyond. Prof Sai said this in Accra when he met representatives of civil society organisations across Africa. Participants were in Ghana for a consultative meeting to define civil society and partners strategy on taking the ICPD forward during the 47th Commission on Population and Development and the United Nations General Assembly Special Session scheduled to take place in New York from April 7 to 11. The interaction dubbed: Conversation with Prof Fred Sai on ICPD, was organised and facilitated by UNFPA to enable Prof. Sai share his thoughts with participants after he had chaired the historic 1994 ICPD in Cairo, Egypt. Prof. Sai expressed regret that, despite the global improvement, Africa has not performed well. Ghana's maternal mortality has been reduced from 500 per 100,000 live births to 350 per 100,000 live births. It will not be able to reach the expected reduction by 2015, he added. He said he was not happy that Ghana, after all these years and efforts made after ICPD, still has more than 30 per cent family planning unmet needs and called for the need to hasten efforts in addressing family planning needs of women. He noted that advances that had been made in maternal and child health and family planning in the past two decades had been considerable, and yet 800 women died daily from causes related to pregnancy or childbirth in 2010, and an estimated 8.7 million young women aged 15 to 24 in developing countries resorted to unsafe abortions in 2008. Prof Sai, who was also the Presidential Advisor on Population, Reproductive Health and HIV and AIDS Issues under President John Agyekum Kufuor, noted that there is a need for Africa to turn the tide around. This, he explained, could be done if government heads exhibits strong political will in addressing family planning issues and placing women and childrens health at top priority. Prof. Sai explained that the ICPD Beyond 2014 Review is an opportunity to influence the future of global population and development policy at national, regional and global levels.