Pregnancy prevention is still a woman’s problem

An RTI report has uncovered that a total of 26 women died while undergoing sterilization in Mumbai over the past five years, ten in 2015 alone. They went through a tubectomy, which has been the mainstay of India’s family planning program since Independence, a method that the government has promoted as safe, reliable and effective.

Yet time and time again, come reminders like this one of how perilous the procedure can be, especially when the women have persistent and deep-rooted health problems. The most heartrending was the aftermath of a government sterilization camp in Bilaspur, Chhatisgarh in 2014. Thirteen women died and over 120 left with serious health problems after the procedures were botched up due to poisonous medicines and medical negligence.

Be it a rural health camp or a thriving metropolis like Mumbai which reportedly has better access to healthcare, the point is that female sterilization is fraught with risk and there has to be a move away from pushing this. Since April this year, the Ministry of Health has finally introduced the much talked about basket of choices in family planning methods across district hospitals, an acknowledgement that a move away from female sterilization is long overdue.

However, making those choices available is a challenge, especially in rural areas. Making sure that stocks of contraceptives are made available at hospitals and primary health centres is just one part of the challenge. Creating awareness and counseling is also an important aspect.

These are demands that cannot be met adequately given the huge shortage of health workers and doctors across urban and rural areas. The main reason why sterilization continues to be used so widely is because it is a gunshot intervention. It requires no follow up, any check ups or counseling over a period of time, which makes it a popular choice with the medical staff.

The same BMC data for Mumbai also tells an interesting story. Between April 2015 to March 2016, 18,910 women in Mumbai underwent a tubectomy, as opposed to just 810 men who opted for vasectomies in the same period. This is despite considerable evidence that vasectomies are less invasive and require less post surgery care.

All this points to how women are so disempowered when it comes to childbirth. She has no say on when, or how many children to have; yet when it comes to preventing a pregnancy, it remains entirely her problem.

“Vasectomy and safe family planning methods need to be aggressively promoted if we care about women’s health”, says Dr Vijaya Sherbet, a gynecologist at Bengaluru’s Columbia Asia Hospital. “That sense of empathy, of political will has been largely missing.”

Signs of a change are evident. Tubectomy rates are down and doctors at government hospitals are promoting alternate FP methods. But this is in Mumbai, the financial capital. Rural India, or even the outskirts of Mumbai city offer an entirely new set of challenges.