Maternal mortality rate still high
JAKARTA (JP): The Ministry of Health admitted yesterday that the government has made little progress in is efforts to reduce the maternal mortality rate.
Director General of Community Health Kumara Rai said that women's health is still vulnerable as indicated by the fact that 390 out of every 100,000 women in labor die.
Rai made the remarks when addressing a national symposium on women's welfare and safe motherhood at the National Institute of Sciences (LIPI).
The disparity of maternal mortality rates among the provinces is still high, with between 130 and 750 out of 100,000 women in labor dying every year, he said.
He revealed that the country's rate is three to six times higher than that of other ASEAN countries and 50 times higher than in industrialized countries.
"The maternal mortality rate in the country has decreased very little since 1986, when 450 out of 100,000 women in labor died," Rai said.
The government, however, is determined to reduce the rate to 225 per 100,000 women by the end of the current Sixth Five-Year Development Plan in 1999, he said.
The 1996 Human Development Report, however, put Indonesia's maternal mortality rate at 650 per 100,000 births.
The four-day symposium, which is co-organized by LIPI, the United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef) and the Central Bureau of Statistics, was opened by LIPI's chairperson Sofjan Tsauri.
Nutrition
Among yesterday's speakers were Unicef representative Stephen J. Woodhouse, sociologist Mely G. Tan, and Theo Vos and Rudi Pittrof, lecturers from London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
Rai pointed out that the high maternal mortality rate is not determined by women's health alone, but is also influenced by nutrition, the lack of gynecologists in some areas, and a reluctance to undergo checkups.
"The main problems which cause the high maternal mortality rate are women's low educational, social and economic status," Rai said.
The government, he said, has already taken various steps to curb the rate by posting at least one midwife in each of Indonesia's more than 60,000 villages.
The government has also established integrated health centers in almost all villages, where mothers can ask for advise and toddlers are given food supplements.
Abdullah Cholil, an assistant to the state minister of women's roles, pointed out that the efforts to reduce the maternal mortality rate are not enough and suggested the government intervene.
"Currently, there is a lack of intervention to reduce the high maternal mortality rate in the country," Abdullah told The Jakarta Post. "The high rate shows that we are unsuccessful in improving women's health," he said.
The government, he said, can intervene by improving women's education level, empower them, promote health services and the family planning program.
In addition, the government should introduce an integrated plan to reduce the high maternal mortality rate along with the public, private sectors, and non-governmental organizations, he said.
President Soeharto has expressed concern over Indonesia's high maternal mortality rate and called for a concerted effort to reduce it. (ste)