Involve males in family planning-MPs

Page 45, July 11, 2008
Story: Emmanuel Adu-Gyamerah
MEMBERS of Parliament (MPs) have called on the Ministry of Health to intensify the promotion of the practice of family planning as its contribution to the country’s quest to attain a middle-income status by 2015.
They noted that the support and involvement of males in family planning were crucial for the achievement of the desired goals of the concept.
The MPs were contributing to a statement made on the floor of the House by the Chairman of the Population Caucus of the House, Ms Theresah Ameley Tagoe, to commemorate World Population Day, which fell yesterday.
The global theme for the celebration of the day was, “Family Planning is right — Let’s make it real”, while in Ghana the theme was, “Repositioning Family Planning is a must for national development — Let’s make it real”.
In her statement, Ms Tagoe noted that the right to plan one’s family was among the rights and fundamental freedoms that applied to every person everywhere.
She reminded the House that in 1994 the International Conference on Population and Development called on all countries to take steps to meet the family planning needs of populations and provide universal access to a full range of safe and reliable family planning methods by 2015.
Ms Tagoe, who is also the MP for Ablekuma South, stated that progress towards the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) was tracked using indicators related to family planning.
“Family planning is good for families, since smaller, healthier families can save for the education of their children and have a better chance of escaping from poverty,” she said.
She said lack of access to family planning information and services, especially for poor women in the rural areas, and the fact that many young people did not have access to separate, confidential and youth friendly services that could offer the needed information had contributed to low contraceptive use in Ghana.
“Mr Speaker, the result of this situation is that Ghana has a rapid population growth rate of 2.3 per cent, a high fertility rate of 4.4, a low contraceptive prevalence rate of 19 per cent and an unacceptably high maternal mortality ratio of 214 per 100,000 live births,” she said.
Ms Tagoe stated that as the country moved forward, it needed to promote family planning and place it high on its development agenda and called on Parliament, which is male dominated, to blaze the trail and contribute to the repositioning of family planning in the country.
Contributing to the statement, the Minority Spokesperson on Women and Children, Mrs Juliana Azumah-Mensah, called on men to accept vasectomy as a family planning method.
She called on the Ministry of Health to intensify its education on the use of contraceptives in order to demystify the practice of family planning.
Other MPs who contributed to the statement were Mr Rashid Pelpuo (Wa Central), Mr Brandford Adu (Okere) and Mr Kwaku Balado-Manu (Ahafo-Ano South).