20 October 2005
This speech was made by Senator Mary Henry at the Capitol Hill Roundtables IWF Seminar.
I am grateful for the invitation to tell you about work in which I have been involved to increase access to health care, educational opportunities, employment and environmental protection. Since the time allowed is short I will concentrate on the projects with which I have been most recently involved.
Ireland is a strong supporter of the United Nations and the achievement of the Millennium Goals. The U.N. Agency with which I have been most involved is UNFPA. The Irish Government is a supporter of UNFPA, believing that improved maternal and child health is essential for the elimination of poverty in developing countries.
In the developed world maternal mortality, that is the ratio of women who die per 100,000 live births, is in low single figures and in most parts of the world there has been a great change for the better in women's health. However, it is profoundly depressing to see how little improvement there has been in maternal mortality figures in Sub-Saharan Africa, in particular in the last 30 years. In some of these countries hundreds, even thousands, of women die either in pregnancy or during labour or shortly after giving birth. The situation is even worse if the mother is a teenager, and one quarter of the deaths are following illegal abortions. Few developing countries have legalised abortion.
Since the fertility rate in many of these countries is 6, 7 or more children, a woman has about a one in ten, one in twelve chance of dying. Half of these women would have no one with any sort of medical training attend them during childbirth.
UNFPA have made a very worthwhile effort to promote greater hygiene during childbirth. A small pack has been produced which has a little plastic sheet on to which the newborn can be delivered, a clean blade to cut the umbilical cord, clean string to tie the cord and swabs to help clean the woman after she has delivered. The distribution of these packs, which cost cents, has greatly reduced the incidence of neonatal tetanus because in the past the umbilical cord was cut with a dirty knife and, even worse, animal dung was sometimes used to staunch bleeding.
UNFPA has given training to the traditional birth attendants. They are given a stick, 5ft long, and are told if the woman is shorter than this, they should try to get her more expert help, small women having a greater difficulty at delivery. They are given a watch and told if the woman is in labour longer than 8 hours on a first delivery or three hours on a subsequent delivery the birth attendant should seek help. Help is often a day's walk away over tracks, the woman being carried on a make shift litter. I have visited several African countries where these changes have been instituted and one hopes for improvement in the treatment of women in labour, with reduced death rates and obstetric complications such as the all too frequent development of obstetric fistula.
We are not entitled to expect women from other cultures to adopt our ways but many women in developing countries seek to reduce their family size or space births further apart. Making contraception available to women who seek it is an important part of UNFPA's work, too. Some people mistakenly believe that UNFPA has supported abortion as a form of family planning in some countries, for example China, but when I have asked those involved in family planning in China about this they have assured me this is not so, and an investigating team of three M.P.s from the United Kingdom, led by Christine McCafferty, supported this assertion.
For those women in developing countries who seek help in spacing their family, injectable contraceptives are particularly popular because the woman need only visit a clinic every three months. Infant mortality is much higher where children are born very close together, the woman being unable to breast feed the child for as long as she would like due to the new arrival needing her milk. The year old child gets poorly nourished on unsuitable food.
Irish women are particularly sensitive to the need for advice on family planning and contraception. It was illegal in Ireland until 30 years ago and contraceptives have been freely available over the last ten to fifteen years, depending on in which part of the country one lived. Ireland's robust economy has been greatly helped by the huge increase in the number of educated women in the workforce. Our family size halved in less than a generation.
Sexually transmitted diseases such as HIV/AIDS, syphilis, gonorrhoea, etc., are very common in developing countries. Social mores about extra marital and premarital sex are not the same as ours. Many women have little say as to whether they will or will not have sex. Suggested programmes from this part of the world to prevent spread of HIV/AIDS may not suit them, for example, Abstinence, Be Faithful and Use a Condom, and we should try to change behaviour on our own home patches first. Last week I was asked by an Ethiopian woman who worked in the U.S. for fifteen years and has now returned home if I couldn't encourage more work on the female condom which gives women some power to prevent infection being transmitted to them.
We in Ireland are supporting the Millennium Goals and women's health and education are two of the priorities. Access to primary education is improving for girls but there are still twice as many illiterate women as men in the world. Women draw the water, get the firewood and work the land of Africa. Solar ovens at 60 dollars each are too dear for them to buy but would mean that for several hours a day they would not be tearing down small trees for firewood, degrading the environment as they go. Their time could be more usefully spent on other activities inside or outside the home.
First Lady Laura Bush has taken a courageous stand to ensure that America's contribution to UNESCO remains at a significant level. I was delighted that President Bush said he supports the Millennium Goals, too, at the recent U.N. Summit. While IWF does not campaign as a body may I ask you as individuals to encourage him to change his mind about UNFPA and support it, too. Women world-wide are nurturers who put the needs of their children ahead of their own. They are the primary caregivers who make significant contributions to the health and well-being of families. Women in the developing world need help from this country.
