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Guyana conducts first demographic health survey
Health Minister Dr. Leslie Ramsammy has revealed that the Government is currently in the process of completing its first demographic health survey (DHS), which will also be the first of its kind in the Caribbean.
At the launching of the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS), Minister Ramsammy emphasised that conducting periodic surveys is important, since it indicates how well the information systems in Government sectors are working.
Dr. Leslie Ramsammy
“When we have DHS being done periodically, it will be testing the health information system and verify whether the system is doing a good job… then, maybe, MICS can be integrated into the DHS,” Minister Ramsammy said.
Sometime in the coming year, Dr. Ramsammy said, the Government will embark on conducting a prison population survey along with a survey of commercial sex workers, and for men who have sex with other men.
A survey will also be done among youths in school and out of school.
According to Minister Ramsammy, the MICS shows that the work that the Health staff, Education Ministry and other sectors are doing is becoming more effective and more efficient.
In this regard, he urged for them to work together, so that the gaps that still exist along with the deficiency are reduced even further.
Meanwhile, this MICS is the second of its kind in Guyana, with the first being done in 2000. It is a nationally representative sample survey of households, and was designed to provide estimates on a large number of indicators on the situation of children and women at the national level for urban and rural areas, as well as interior and coastal areas.
The objectives of the survey are to provide up-to-date information for assessing the situation of women and children in Guyana, to furnish data needed for monitoring progress towards the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) and other agreed-upon goals, to contribute to the improvement of data and monitoring systems in Guyana, and to strengthen technical expertise in the design, implementation and analysis of such systems.
The survey targeted 5,280 households, of which 5,229 were found to be occupied. Of those occupied, over 5,000 were successfully interviewed, resulting in a response rate of 96 percent.
MICS found that although children under five years of age are equally spread out in coastal and interior areas, 85 percent reside in rural Guyana, and almost 42 percent of the population is below 18 years of age, while 70 percent of the sampled households are headed by males.
The survey also found that 29 percent of all children under five years old are living in households without their biological fathers, and that 30 percent come from the poorest quintile, while 13 percent come from the richest quintile.
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