Govt to improve effort on health

Govt to improve effort on health

Sari P. Setiogi, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Indonesia must improve its health services and reduce maternal
deaths if it hopes to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, a
report released by the World Bank says.

The report says that every hour at least two women in the
country die during childbirth, or about 20,000 mothers each year
from about five million deliveries.

According to the report, which was released recently, the
country's maternal mortality rate has been reduced to 307 per
100,000 live births from 450 in 1986. However, the country may
not meet the millennium development goal of 125 maternal deaths
per 100,000 births by 2010.

Hemorrhaging, eclampsia, complications from abortion,
obstructed labor and infections are still the main causes of
maternal deaths here.

However, more women are being attended by professional health
workers during birth, from only 43.2 percent in 1997 to 66.2
percent last year.

"More effort is needed. Some women still prefer to go to a
traditional midwife because they are cheaper and also offer to do
the housework after the mother gives birth," said the chairwoman
of the National Family Planning Coordinating Board, Sumarjati
Arjoso.

In comparison, fellow members of the Association of Southeast
Asian Nations (ASEAN) have much lower maternal mortality rates.
Thailand records 24 deaths per 100,000 live births, Vietnam 100
and the Philippines 172.

Indonesia has halved its infant mortality rate from 91 per
1,000 live births in 1990 to just 45 in 2002.

Compare that to Cambodia, where one in every seven children
does not reach his fifth birthday.

One of the main factors in the lower infant mortality rate
here is a comprehensive measles immunization program. The number
of children aged between 12 months and 23 months immunized
against measles increased from 57.5 percent in 1992 to 71.6
percent in 2002.

However, at least 26 children below the age of five in Alor,
East Nusa Tenggara province, died recently in an outbreak of
measles.

The World Bank report also found Indonesia has been reducing
malnutrition by some 5 percent annually.

That figure is impressive when compared to fellow ASEAN
countries. Malnutrition has been falling 1.1 percent annually in
Myanmar and Cambodia, 0.9 percent in Laos and 0.6 percent in the
Philippines.

World Bank president James D. Wolfensohn said during the
release of the report, Rising to the Challenges: The Millennium
Development Goals for Health, that countries needed to look at
measures such as committing increased resources to meeting the
health-related Millennium Development Goals.

The World Bank said increasing health spending was necessary
to get poor people the effective treatment they need.

Indonesia has allocated some Rp 7.4 trillion (US$820 million)
for health spending in 2005, or about 16 percent of the total Rp
123 trillion state budget.

Eight Millennium Development Goals were set at the United
Nations Millennium Summit in September 2000, where 189 countries
committed to ambitious targets for improving the health and well-
being of hundreds of millions of people in the developing world
by 2015.

Four of the goals relate directly to health. They are to
reduce the maternal mortality rate by three-quarters and the
child mortality rate by two-thirds, to halve the proportion of
people suffering from hunger, combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other
diseases, and to improve access to safe drinking water and
essential drugs.