RAPID

Tanzania
Promoting Womens Health
Having a child is a joyous event, but it also entails some risk to the health of the mother and her child. Health conditions have improved greatly in the past decade in Tanzania, and more births are taking place in health facilities and being attended by skilled health professionals.1 However, experts estimate that one Tanzanian woman or adolescent girl dies every hour due to complications from pregnancy or childbirth. Today, one out of every 20 infants born does not survive his/her first year.2 By using family planning, couples can avoid unintended pregnancy and reduce the overall health risks to mothers and children. Three key interventions are needed: 1. Prevent high-risk births 2. Postpone the first birth until at least age 18 3. Space births at least three years apart face serious complications due to prematurity, low birth weight, infections, and breathing difficulties. These conditions can also lead to long-term illness and disability for both the mother and child.

Women

Postpone the First Birth

About half of Tanzanian adolescents become parents in their teenage years. By age 19, more than two in five (44%) young women are either mothers or are pregnant with their first child.4 These early births pose a higher health risk for a young mother because her body is not yet fully mature. In addition, many girls drop out of school because of pregnancy, thus ending their education and their prospects for gaining skills to earn a living.5

Prevent High-Risk Births

Preventing high-risk births would help to improve survival rates among women and children. In Tanzania, nearly three in five births pose a higher risk to the mothers and childs health.3 A birth is considered high risk if a woman becomes pregnant at too early or too late an age, her births are too closely spaced, or she has had four or more births. Life-threatening complications associated with childbirth are severe bleeding, infection, convulsion, and obstructed labour. Newborns also

Photos on this page: Frank Spangler, Worldview Images

November 2012

RAPID Women Tanzania: Promoting Womens Health

Space Births
Births that are spaced less than three years apart pose higher health risks for the mother and her child.6 Many couples would like to space or limit births but may not know what their options are. The safest and most effective way to space and limit births is to use modern family planning methods. A variety of contraceptive methods are available for women and men to use.

What Can Be Done

Despite the progress made, the Government of Tanzania and its collaborating partners can take a more active role in making family planning information and services more widely available.

Implement community awareness-raising programmes for men and women on the benefits of family planning on womens and childrens health and family welfare Expand in-school education on sexual and reproductive health and scale up training for teachers Ensure an adequate and consistent supply of contraceptives in rural areas with a choice of several methods Raise the legal age of marriage for girls to 18 Make youth-friendly sexual and reproductive health services available in rural and urban areas Engage men in interventions to address maternal health and family planning.

Photo by CIFOR

Supportive Policies
The Government of Tanzania has made significant progress in reducing the number of high-risk births and maternal deaths over the past decade. The government has enacted supportive policies to promote maternal and child health, as well as family planning:

These key actions would benefit families and communities throughout Tanzania and help todays youth make informed decisions to protect their health.
1

National Population Policy (2006)aims to improve the standard of living and quality of life of Tanzanias people and help women advance Reproductive Health Strategic Plan (20082015) aims to reduce maternal, neonatal, and child illness and death Reproductive and Child Health Strategy (2011 2015) and the National Standards for Peer Educators for Young Peopleaim to address the reproductive health problems of youth.

Tanzania National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) and ICF Macro. 2011. Tanzania Demographic and Health Survey 2010. Dar es Salaam, Tanzania: NBS and ICF Macro. NBS and ICF Macro, 2011. United Republic of Tanzania Ministry of Education and Vocational Training (MOEVT) 2011. Basic Education Statistics in Tanzania (BEST). Dar es Salaam: MOEVT. NBS and ICF Macro, 2011.

2, 3, 4 5

WAMA thanks the David and Lucile Packard Foundation for its generous support.

Wanawake Na Maendeleo (WAMA) Foundation is a nongovernmental organisation founded by the Tanzanian First Lady, Mama Salma Kikwete, in 2006. Its goal is to improve the life standard of women and children by promoting access to education, health services, and capacity building for economic empowerment. Major programme areas are girls education, womens empowerment, health promotion and advocacy, and orphans and vulnerable children.

WAMA Foundation P.O. Box 10641 Dar es Salaam, Tanzania Tel: 255 22 2126516 Fax: 255 22 2121916 Email: info@wamafoundation.or.tz http://www.wamafoundation.or.tz