Strategic approach apace to tackle maternal and child mortality

May 29, 2015 News

The services of an increased number of well-trained doctors in the area of Obstetrics and Gynaecology

Minister of Public Health, Dr George Norton

at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC) supported by skilled midwives could be the formula for arresting the challenge of maternal and infant mortality, according to recently sworn-in Minister of Public Health, Dr George Norton. These workers, he has asserted, must also be well compensated.
And Guyana is in dire need of a strategic tactic to curb the aforementioned challenge if it is to achieve Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) Four and Five before year-end.
Moreover, the Minister noted that “I am of the opinion that the only time we are going to take control of our maternal and infantile mortality rate is when we have at least 10 Guyanese trained Obstetric/Gynaecologists working in the Georgetown Hospital with well-trained midwives being given benefits.”
As such, he said that he will be working towards putting measures in place to achieve the desired outcome. Accordingly, Dr Norton added, that moves will be made towards ensuring that the overtime for these workers is not taxed and that they are readily afforded duty free concessions where applicable as he alluded to the distance that some medical practitioners travel to perform their duties. He also hinted to the possibility of housing availabilities for these workers pointing out that efficient performances are more likely “when persons know that they are going home to their own homes.”
“These are some of the things that we have to take into consideration…the training alone is not all; the education alone is not all, it is the conditions under which nurses and so on work (and) there are very good nurses whose hearts are with the system, but it is not going to happen if we don’t take it holistically and address these issues,” said the Health Minister.
In September 2000, 191 United Nations Member States, Guyana included, signed a UN Millennium Declaration committing them to achieve eight precisely outlined MDGs by 2015. This therefore committed the Member States to tackle developmental challenges including poverty, hunger, disease, illiteracy, environmental degradation and discrimination against women.
Moreover, the eight goals are: to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger; to achieve universal primary education; to promote gender equality; to reduce child mortality; to improve maternal health; to combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases; to ensure environmental sustainability and to develop a global partnership for development.
But it was just last year that the United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) Representative to Guyana and Suriname, Marianne Flach, observed that while Guyana had achieved several MDGs and was well on its way to achieving several more, there are some that are proving to be more elusive and costly to attain.
She was at the time speaking at the launch of the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS). Guyana, Flach noted, as at last year, was able to achieve the MDGs relating to hunger, primary education, gender equality and environmental sustainability, but is struggling to tackle MDGs Four and Five which speak specifically to reducing infant and maternal mortality.
“While we have made significant progress in reducing Under Five mortality through better vaccination coverage and management of childhood illnesses, neonatal mortality is still a critical issue,” said Flach.
The UNICEF Rep pointed out that “too many children still die from preventable causes within the first month of life,” as she went on to amplify the importance of the MICS, which can provide needful data to identify the fatal trends in order to activate plans to address them.
The MICS, according to her, is an important monitoring tool for assessing the wellbeing of children, women and their families, as the MICS survey collects data for more than 20 of the 48 MDG indicators.
The MICS is said to the largest international household survey to collect information on many MDG indicators in a short period. She therefore noted that “for Guyana to continue making progress as a lower-middle income country, sound information on child rights indicators is crucial for formulating and revising national and sub-national policies, and for monitoring to ensure the country’s progress towards the achievement of the MDGs, and other global commitments aimed at promoting the welfare of children.”
And this is important, Flach noted, in light of the fact that “gaps in data often impede Guyana’s efforts to formulate effective policies and programmes, and can present a challenge when channelling the country’s limited resources to those most in need.”
At the same forum, Chief Medical Officer Dr Shamdeo Persaud admitted that a shortage of skilled obstetricians is one of the biggest challenges Guyana has had in its efforts to reduce its maternal mortality rate. Without specifying the number of trained Obstetricians in the system, he said that strategic measures have been put in place to build capacity to address the existing shortcomings.
“One of our key indicators that I think everyone is paying special attention to is the maternal mortality ratio,” said Dr Persaud, as he acknowledged that “it has been a little bit difficult to get to our target, but I know with the resolve of everyone, including Government and all of our partners, we are moving swiftly to achieve less than 80 (deaths) per 100,000 births.”
He asserted even then, too, that Guyana’s aim is to have less than 11 maternal deaths on an annual basis. “I am optimistic that we will do it this year (2014) and that we will continue to do it in the future.”
However, like 2013, Guyana last year recorded 18 maternal deaths and there have reportedly been a number of preventable infant deaths, suggesting that the measures activated hadn’t yielded the desired results.