Rwanda makes health-facility deliveries more feasible

Abstract

Rwanda has seen a substanitial improvement in maternal health recently. This success has partly hinged on a medical insurance scheme known as Mutuelles de Sante through which women can access medical facilities at nominal costs and a government policy under which women deliver at no cost if they have completed four standard antenatal visits. The results have been impressive say donor bodies and humanitarian agencies which are actively supporting initiatives to improve maternal health in this small central African country. Nevertheless the country has one of the worst maternal mortality rates in the world at 750 per 100 000 livebirths - down from 1071 early this decade. Female adult mortality rates shot up dramatically in the aftermath of the 1994 genocide which killed an estimated 80 000 people. Solange Hakiba head of maternal health at the Ministry of Health says even during 1995-2000 it was 1.8 times higher than pregenocide levels. (excerpt)