Investment in reproductive health a necessity: Gervais Beninguisse

Iford recently recommended during a press conference in Yaoundé that investment in reproductive health is a necessity. "Invest in family planning services to save money."

These remarks were made by Prof. Gervais Beninguisse, researcher and, on the other hand, Director of cooperation and support for the development at the Institute of training and demographic research (Iford) in Yaoundé.

It was at a press conference on the restitution of the report of the study: "costs, profits associated with reproductive health in Cameroon" which took place Tuesday in Yaoundé. A study carried out since January last by Iford and the Guttmacher Institute in New York.

During this research, the experts reported that no investment has been made so far in the field of reproductive health. This is as a result of the fact that 63% of women wanting to avoid pregnancy do not use modern method of contraception.

Worse still, almost a million of Cameroonian women have an unplanned pregnancy. This low level of contraceptive elevates, according to Prof. Gervais Beninguisse, the alarming statistics of maternal mortality rates in the country.

However, according to this analysis, the satisfaction of half of the method of modern contraception needs would be of important health benefits. This would, indeed, avoid nearly 187,000 unplanned pregnancies each year, 95,000 unplanned births, 65,000 induced abortions and 600 maternal deaths.

"Meeting half of the needs of modern contraceptives would save 1.3 billion f and the satisfaction of these needs would save 2.7 billion f and the money saved might be useful in other areas," concluded Prof. Gervais Beninguisse.