Reproductive Health Rights: A Case Study in India (original) (raw)
Related papers
Women reproductive rights in India: prospective future
2011
Reproductive rights were established as a subset of the human rights. Parents have a basic human right to determine freely and responsibly the number and the spacing of their children. Issues regarding the reproductive rights are vigorously contested, regardless of the population's socioeconomic level, religion or culture. Following review article discusses reproductive rights with respect to Indian context focusing on socio economic and cultural aspects. Also discusses sensitization of government and judicial agencies in protecting the reproductive rights with special focus on the protecting the reproductive rights of people with disability (mental illness and mental retardation).
Reproductive Health Status of Indian Women: A Critical Appraisal
Reproductive health is fundamental to social and economic development of a family, community as well as nation, and a key component of an equitable society. Reproductive health is important for gender equality and women empowerment. Women's reproductive health status is poor, and their sexual and reproductive rights are not fully raised in many countries, maternal mortality rates are higher, and women's, chances of dying of pregnancy-related complications are almost 50 times higher in developing countries than in developed countries. Women are particularly vulnerable and also have a lack of knowledge regarding reproductive health in India. Reproductive health is a concept of human rights. Important areas of concern for reproductive health programmes in India are poor quality of reproductive health services especially in an urgent situation; lack of focus of adolescent's knowledge on reproductive health and lack of education. Women in India and particularly the economically disadvantaged women suffer the highest rates of complications due to pregnancy such as sexually transmitted diseases, and reproductive cancers. Lack of access to comprehensive reproductive care is the main reason, and many women suffer and die. Women are deprived of access to reproductive health care services and are influenced by the socioeconomic cultural factors. Which include low social status in family and community, lack of access to economic resource and education, inability to make a decision about their health, nutrition and so on? Reproductive health facilities at the community level are poorly equipped to deal with gynecological and obstetric. Reproductive health is defined as a 'state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absences of disease or infirmity, in all matters relating to the reproductive systems and to its functions and processes' (United States: 1994). Reproductive health addresses the human sexuality and reproductive processes, functions and system at all stages of life and implies that people are able to have a satisfying and safe sex life and that they have the capacity to reproduce and the freedom to decide, when and how often to do so. The main objectives of this study are; to study the reproductive health situation in an Indian context, to know the problems of women in respective of their reproductive system, the study aims at assessing the reproductive health status of Indian women, and to understand the relationship between reproductive health and gender rights.
2014
Women’s health status is affected by complex biological, social and cultural factors, which are interrelated and only can be addressed in a comprehensive manner. Reproductive health is determined not only by the quality and availability of health care, but also by socio-economic development levels, lifestyles and women’s position in society. Women health is compromised not by lack of medical knowledge, but by infringement on women’s human rights including reproductive health rights. Poor women, who lack adequate food, basic health care, or modern contraception, suffer grave consequences for reproductive health. A woman who is malnourished and in poor health runs much greater risks in reproductive health issues and usually suffers without proper treatment and dies in most of cases.
Reproductive Rights of Women in India with special reference to Chittoor District.docx
Reproductive health right is a condition in which reproduction is accomplished in a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being, and not merely as the absence of disease or disorders of the reproductive processes. But the overall situation is quite drastic in India where women's reproductive health rights are always ignored which has been depicted in this study. In this study Chittoor District was specially selected because; it deserves a good alternative for improving reproductive health of women. So, this study has a greater significance and importance in policy making, which could play a key role in a country's development, especially in rural areas since women from these areas belong to the most deprived sections of society facing adverse conditions in terms of social and economic inequality, a visual majority of them being extremely poor. Considering the scenario, the main objective of this study was to investigate the status of women's reproductive health rights in rural areas through age at marriage and family planning acceptance. Hopefully, the findings of this empirical study would be very helpful to the policy makers of GOs and NGOs, as well as researchers.
Reproductive health of women in India
International journal of health sciences
Women’s health, including sexual and reproductive health, is integral to that of the whole person. The freedom to choose and decide on one’s own life’s path, including whether or not to have a family and when to start a family, hinges on this. Access to correct information, effective and inexpensive methods of contraception, and timely services and support in response to unexpected pregnancies are all components of reproductive health that go beyond just physical well-being. However, there is still a lack of familiarity with reproductive health services among policymakers, programme managers, and the general public in India, despite the fact that the Indian government has reaffirmed its commitment to the values of the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development. The present paper’s major goal is to examine the current social and legal impediments in India that are affecting women’s health and well-being as well as to provide strategies for overcoming those barriers.
Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights in India
SpringerBriefs in Public Health
SpringerBriefs in Public Health present concise summaries of cutting-edge research and practical applications from across the entire field of public health, with contributions from medicine, bioethics, health economics, public policy, biostatistics, and sociology. The focus of the series is to highlight current topics in public health of interest to a global audience, including health care policy; social determinants of health; health issues in developing countries; new research methods; chronic and infectious disease epidemics; and innovative health interventions. Featuring compact volumes of 50 to 125 pages, the series covers a range of content from professional to academic. Possible volumes in the series may consist of timely reports of state-of-the art analytical techniques, reports from the field, snapshots of hot and/or emerging topics, elaborated theses, literature reviews, and in-depth case studies. Both solicited and unsolicited manuscripts are considered for publication in this series. Briefs are published as part of Springer's eBook collection, with millions of users worldwide. In addition, Briefs are available for individual print and electronic purchase. Briefs are characterized by fast, global electronic dissemination, standard publishing contracts, easy-to-use manuscript preparation and formatting guidelines, and expedited production schedules. We aim for publication 8-12 weeks after acceptance.
Women's Health and Rights in India: Issues and Concerns
The Indian Journal of Public Administration, 2015
The article examines the integral link between women s health, rights and the policies and programmes of the State regarding them. The analysis of the statistical profile of women from the Census of India, National Health Financing Scheme (NHFS) and the National Sample Survey (NSS) provides a comprehensive overview of the status of women in India. Each and every dimension of women s health and rights rangingfrom survival, mortality, marriage, fertility to work participation, domestic violence and political participation is highlighted here. The article draws attention not only to the statistical trends concerning women and girls in India, but also to the policy and programmatic factors that act upon, influence and sometimes impede women s access to their rights in each and every field. The complex interplay of socio-cultural ethos and the policy environment reflected in the attitudes and mindset of the government is brought to fore. The ideological consciousness of the government au...
Reproductive & Child Health of the Poor in India
World Bank , 2004
In recent years there has been a growing concern for women’s health in developing countries. This is evident from the adoption of women’s health perspectives in strategies addressing child survival, family planning and women’s development issues. This concern necessitates authentic information that can provide a diagnosis of women’s health status and needs in a developing country as ours. This part of the report studies various aspects of reproductive health by (i) conducting a literature survey, (ii) analyzing secondary data on that indicator to see the trend and current status using data sources such as the National Family Health Survey and Reproductive Child Health Survey, and (iii) studying the factors that affect some of the key outcome indicators with the help of econometric analysis. The indicators of Reproductive and Child Health that we have analyzed in this section are as follows: • Demographic rates • Fertility and Family Planning • Safe Motherhood • Post-natal Care and Child Survival • Reproductive Health Morbidity • Broader Issues Related to Women’s Reproductive Health In compiling and analysing data for the above-mentioned RCH outcomes, our focus has been to see how these variables impact on the poor and marginalized sections of the society. The analysis has been done separately for: • Rural and urban areas. • Social groups and religions (SC, ST, Muslim, Christian, Hindus Others) • Economic classes (Quintiles calculated on basis of index derived from asset ownership and use) • Across time There are significant inter-state differences, therefore state-level studies are very important.. All India estimates should be crosschecked with those of the focus states, as the conditions in states might be very different. • The so-called north-south India differences are a gross aggregation. States in southern India also require making great improvements even though they might be somewhat better off economically. • The fact that there are significant inter-state differences also points to the possibility of significant intra-state differences. • The most ‘RH deprived’ districts are identified as those where RH indicators are the poorest. This is done for all the states of India, and the data is hi-lighted for the identified four states. The poorest 20 percent economic sections might not be highly different from the not so poor (poorest 40 or even 60 percent) in many indicators of RH. The low sex ratio shows that focusing policy on women could have a large impact on the overall demographic and social sustainability of progress The relatively high death rates for those in the 0 to 4 age group also reveals the great improvements that are possible by focusing on children The above two point to the importance of gender sensitivity of policy in the social sector. Both child and mother are the basic building blocks of any society and economy. Poor RH indicators imply poor conditions being faced by mothers and children. That only underscores the importance of studies and policy action focused on reproductive health. In almost all the cases the most under-privileged are quite apparent – economically the poorest, lower social groups, and those in rural areas are worse off. On the whole we find that those indicators that are related to the mother or the child receiving or availing of some health related service the measures are much lower than those where their own inherent health is being measured. However this is less true for Ante-natal care. That is one measure that shows that about two thirds of the women are covered. As a result IFT supplementation and tetanus injections also show relatively better performance across the board. Assistance during delivery and in locations with better medical facilities is a significantly weak area where coverage of RH services in considered. Less than a third of the births occur in hospital whereas as many as two thirds of the births have some pre-delivery complications. The results strongly show that the conventional approach to fertility and family planning has not been able to cover the most underprivileged sections. The privileged – better educated, higher economic and social classes and those living in urban areas are better – but even these sections are not fully ‘covered’. Poor design of government programs, lack of public-private partnership, lack of sensitivity to women’s requirements, etc. may have contributed to this, but why they have failed or not succeeded as much as they should have is a necessary precondition before policy measures can be designed to improve upon them. Education is by the far the most important factor in better fertility and family planning indicators, on safe motherhood as well as all RH related indicators studied. Mother’s education has a greater marginal impact than economic class (quintiles) on most marriage, fertility, and family planning variables. The household head’s education is also found to significantly improve the likelihood of achieving better RH outcomes in many if not most cases. An understanding of the actual difference between educated and less educated women is also important from another perspective. Issues such as use of contraceptives have to a large extent been driven by the way they have been ‘sold’ by government and allied forces. Perhaps as a result non-permanent contraception has not really taken off both for highly and for less educated women. It is also clear that contraceptive use by younger couples will have to be primarily temporary (non-sterilization) if it is to expand. And a better understanding of the thought process as well as decision taking process will enable a better design of family planning measures. Though significant differences are found between Muslim, Christian and Hindu women, the econometric analysis shows that many if not most of these differences can be explained due to differing socio-economic conditions faced by the different religious groups. Better economic profile tends to have some impact on a woman’s inherent health and so does better education. • However, the impact of better economic status appears to be relatively more of anemia and weight. • In the case of receiving ANC (or IFT or tetanus injection) however a better economic profile appears to matter less than better education. Further work in this area will be essential if a policy measures that are more ‘accessible’ to underprivileged women are to be put in place. It is found that purely greater education does not necessarily improve a woman’s ability to have a safer mother-hood; it also needs to be supported by a better economic profile. At the same time, purely having a better economic profile does not necessarily imply that better ANC will be received. The trends show that assistance during birth has improved significantly in the six-year gap between 1992-93 and 1998-99. Both for rural and urban areas the improvement has been of the order of 10 percentage points. Significantly however, in rural areas, the improvement has been predominantly for the higher economic classes and less so for the lowest quintiles. In the case of the urban areas however, the improvement has been predominantly for the lowest three quintiles. The results suggest that suggest the following for policy to incorporate: • A well functioning and well-spread PHC network can have a significant impact. However the critical issue is well functioning public services. The data also shows that purely spending greater amounts does not ensure better RH outcomes in terms of RH indicators. • Private health care providers presence does not matter significantly – local governments should consider how locally based private practitioners could be ‘incorporated’ into providing RH services as well • Education of the mother matters in all likelihood because of better awareness levels, is it feasible to increase awareness without having to educate the mother. Educating adults tends to be a very difficult task and has large time-gaps. • The links between education–mass media access-autonomy and economic power are important factors in a woman awareness levels and her ability to decide for herself. Micro-level studies would be essential to find the routes through which these links work. • In other words, higher awareness, greater ability to make choices, better accessibility are the important links throughout the different issues studied. • Pure economic or accessibility issues, are not necessarily the only constraints – it is the various links that are missing for the bulk of the women in the country and putting these links in place would enable the rapid improvement in RH indicators. • Purely putting in more funds or improving village level infrastructure, or providing greater services will not necessarily lead to the reaching or crossing of the MDG goals. • Appropriate RH policy would be one that is able to decipher the links between awareness and decision-making and remove those constraints. However, in a society where it will be difficult to change both the critical factor rapidly (education level of the mother and economic profile of households), the key policy question is how can better awareness levels be created in uneducated women so that they demand better and more services. At the same time, how can services be provided such that they are within the economic reach of the poor and the under-privileged? These are the key RH policy questions. It then follows whether it is feasible or desirable to enhance private delivery of reproductive services? Can some basic minimum quality be ensured? Do such services need to be subsidized? And who should subsidize them? The answers to these questions will be essential for a better delineation of what RH policy should aim at and how.
Reproductive, Maternal and Child Health in India: A Sociological Study
isara solutions, 2022
Reproductive, Maternal health and obstetric services are very important for building a healthy and strong nation. Safe maternal is not just the name of safe delivery. It is the condition which is dependent on many other factors. In this direction, all those reasons have to be removed which create obstacles in the way of safe maternal. The maternal mortality rate in India is very high, here about 5 women per 1000 die during childbirth. Similarly, the child mortality rate is also very high here as compared to some developed countries. The condition of Indian women is still worrying from the health point of view…