By Diana Hague | Project Leader
Hello to all of our donors-
We wanted to give you a quick update on news of the Kenyan government’s recent public commitment to family planning on account of the country’s unsustainable population growth. The below remarks come from a Kenyan publication called, The Standard Group:
‘Planning Minister Wycliffe Oparanya has promised to revive family planning programmes to counter the country’s high rate of population growth…..
If Kenya did not control its high rates of population growth, quality of education, health and housing would suffer while food security will decline.’
‘NCAPD statistics show that Kenya’s population increased by 12 million since 1999 to stand at 40 million today, a 35 per cent rise in only a decade.’
"The risks caused by overpopulation include lack of living space, shortage of jobs, sky-high housing prices, environmental deterioration and scarcity of energy and resources…."
The clinic has just returned from an eight-day monitoring and evaluation trek in northern Samburu. Camping alongside dried up riverbeds, and conversing with the local Samburu at the watering holes, we observed the impact and reality of over-population. This region has not seen rain in more than 8 months. Luckily various organizations such as USAID, have installed pumps, so there is clean water for the people and their livestock, but, as I am sure you know, the question remains- for how long?
One of our most dynamic family planning mobilizers named Susan Lenatari accompanied us on this trip and during the day she would walk through the various villages simply speaking to the local men and women about health services in the area, the availability and or knowledge of family planning and whether or not there was a demand for it. Often times we can find ourselves developing all sorts of complex charts and questionnaires in order to gather information, yet, what continuously proves to be most informative, is good old fashioned face to face casual conversation.
We are making another trip up to these areas at the beginning of June and will be anxious to inform you of the demand we were met with.
Thank you again for your continuous generosity. What you give, whatever amount, goes a long, long, way……
Below are the numbers reached over the past three months:
COMMUNITY HEALTH AFRICA TRUST
FAMILY PLANNING STATISTICS 1st QUARTER, JAN-MAR2011
Insertions / Implants ( 5 years): 1379
Depo – Injectibles ( 3 months): 768
Oral - Pills: 635
Tube Ligations (TLs): 21
Condoms: 16,000
No of people reached with reproductive health information: 6,159
*Stats include the static clinic ,motor and camel mobiles
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