The government has undertaken a special ‘Safe Life’ project to ensure maternity services for women to reduce maternal and child mortality rate to zero level.
As part of its move, the Department of Social Services has placed the project proposal titled “Safe Motherhood through Improving Quality of Life” to the planning commission for approval.
By implementing this, it is hoped that by 2023, the maternal and child mortality rate in the project area will be reduced to zero and the overall quality of life of at least 90 percent of the poor, backward and disadvantaged people will be improved.
The Project Evaluation Committee (PEC) meeting will be held on September 26. According to sources, the total cost of the project will be Tk 48.78 crore. Of this, Tk 39.3 crore will be spent from government funds and Tk 9.65 crore from prospective agencies.
The project is expected to start this year and be implemented by June 2024.
The project proposal states that if the project is implemented, maternal and child mortality will be reduced.
The nutritional value of maternal and child health will be improved. The quality of service for pregnant mothers, and newborns will be improved and ensured.
According to the BBS sample survey, the maternal and neonatal mortality rate in Bangladesh is very high and this rate is even higher in rural areas.
The main reasons for the high rate of maternal and child mortality are child marriage and childbirth at home with the help of incompetent midwives or relatives.
Adolescent mothers have the highest risk of neonatal death. Their children are malnourished, they are underweight. As a result, they die.
73 percent of all neonatal deaths occurred at home. One of the reasons is the low social status of women and family insecurity.
Most of the children in the country suffer from malnutrition. Due to malnutrition, children can get various complex diseases and even die at an early age.
Severe malnutrition is the cause of about one-third of child deaths. The project has been proposed for the mother and child service activities of 452,543 families in 1,839 villages of 106 unions in seven Municipalities of 10 upazilas of Rajbari, Faridpur and Gopalganj districts of Dhaka division.
The main activities of the project are purchase of 319 motor vehicles, purchase of machinery, equipment, manpower of 53 people, 99 computers, 13 sets of furniture, in-house training of 5,135 people, hygiene materials, 3,560 promotions and advertisements, production and screening of audio video films, seminars.
