RANCHI: The
state ministry of health, medical education and family welfare pledged to reduce the state's alarmingly
high percentage of teenage pregnancies in the coming years on the occasion of national safe motherhood day on Wednesday.
According to the
National Health and Family Survey (NHFS) -m 4 data, 12 out of every 100 pregnant women in Jharkhand are in their teens. The teenage pregnancies in Jharkhand are higher than the national average of 7.9.
"Teenage pregnancies are responsible for health implications for pregnant women in the state such as anaemia. It is also responsible for growing abortions and high maternal mortality rate (MMR)," principal secretary of health Nidhi Khare said.
At an event organized to observe national safe motherhood day, Khare said the department was concentrating its efforts to reduce
teenage pregnancy to zero in Jharkhand as soon as possible.
"Awareness campaigns are being held to educate women about ill-effects of marrying before the age of 19 years. But that is still not enough," she added.
MMR remains a cause for worry in Jharkhand with over 202 women dying out of every one lakh live births. Khare said though the MMR had dropped from previous years, it needed to be further reduced to 165, which is closer to the national average.
Khare said the health department was working on a plan to rope in retired government doctors and private practitioners for providing help to women with gynaecological problems and surgeries in rural areas.
"That apart, we are planning to rope in auxiliary nurse midwives (ANMs) and general nursing midwives (GNMs) for training so that they know their protocols in ante-natal check-ups," she added.
"We have decided to set up blood banks in eight districts in three months so that c-section surgeries can be performed even at night as well, Khare said.
She also added that safe abortion protocols will have to be maintained for reducing the MMR rate in the state. "Family planning methods are to be briefed to mothers before pregnancy," she said.
Mothers and their children at the safe motherhood day programme's venue in Ranchi on Wednesday.
