Health Minister rejects maternal mortality report

Dec 18, 2009 News

By Andrunie Harris

Minister of Health Dr. Leslie Ramsammy has refuted the World Economic Forum (WEF) report, which stated that countries that have “permissive” or lenient laws as it relates to abortions show poor reduction rates of maternal mortality.
The report mentioned Guyana, and said that of all the South American nations, it ranks the country with the highest maternal mortality rate in the continent.
The report added that Guyana’s maternal mortality rate is some 30 times higher than that of Chile; which was listed as being the safest country in South America for women to bear children.
In this regard Dr. Ramsammy clearly stated that the figures mentioned in the report are an error “I suspect it is a misprint,” said Ramsammy at a recent press briefing.
The Minister was unaware of where the information the organisation obtained on Guyana originated from, saying “sometimes it is easy for me to explain this because they use an old number…the 470 per 1000 deliveries that the World Economic Forum reported is a number that I cannot fathom, and I do not know where they got it from…. because nobody previously has reported this number and Guyana has never reported that number”
The Health Minister reiterated that even in Guyana’s worst period of maternal deaths, the figures mentioned in the WEF report “was not even close…. so it does not matter which Government period you want to take, we have never been that (bad).”
“It is a number that obviously somebody misprinted…. so even if we have our quarrels amongst say PAHO/WHO, UNICEF, the Ministry of Health as to what is the right number and you take the worst number from among us…it is not even close to what is reported there.”
Dr. Ramsammy declared that these kinds of organisations should inform the Health Ministry of their reports before making them public, “it is some arrogance, because these organisations need to talk to us a little bit before they publish these things.”
The Health Minister explained that Guyana has come out of a period where information was under reported, and as such reported figures could have been between 30 percent and 60 percent less than the actual number.
He stated that this dilemma was addressed, and that the recording of information has improved over the years, “so that the numbers that are currently in the system are close to what reality is.”
“Please understand that there was a period, and where ever the number was represented, only a fraction of it was the truth…. And today what is being reported is virtually close to the 100% that you need to report.”
Dr. Ramsammy noted that because Guyana’s population is small, it is impractical to report by 100,000 births, and so Guyana’s reports carry per 10,000 births. He stated that in 1991 Guyana’s maternal mortality rate was 18.2 per 10,000, “these were among the worst times in Guyana.”
As of 2008 the figures have reduced to some 11.2 per 10,000 births, and the Health Minister indicated that the rate is approximately 10 per 10,000 in 2009. “And if that happens it will be the first time that we are close to going single digit in terms of 10,000 deliveries…and that’s our goal…. to reach 8 per 10,000 by 2012,” noted Dr. Ramsammy.
The report that Dr. Ramsammy has refuted said that Guyana has allowed abortions “without almost any restriction since in 1995.” It stated that “ironically,” one of the main explanations behind the liberalizing of Guyana’s law was to enhance the “attainment of safe motherhood” by eliminating deaths and complications associated with unsafe abortions.

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