The Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation announced its first infant death for the year on 1st February. The Hospital announced the death of a second infant one month later. Infants die of complications in pregnancy, childbirth or postpartum every year. Infants also die by accident, drowning and suffocation before their first birthday. Guyana’s unhappy record has moved from six infant deaths in 2020 to ten in 2022.
Former President David Granger, speaking on his weekly programme − The Public Interest – lamented that infant and neonatal deaths are a national disgrace. He attributed most infant deaths to the challenges of demography, geography, gender inequality and poverty. He felt that babies’ chances of survival should not be compromised by their mothers’ geographic region of residence or economic status which cause inequities in their access to lifesaving health services.
Mr. Granger explained, further, that infant and neonatal deaths could occur as a result of several factors, many of which are related to malnourishment and poverty. Some causes could be anaemic mothers; bacterial infection; ‘pre-term’ birth, when a baby is born before 37 weeks of pregnancy; respiratory distress; sudden death syndrome; underweight babies; unintended injury or suffocation; unhealthy pregnant, or postpartum, persons owing to their mental and physical condition; unsupervised home deliveries and unsanitary surrounding conditions.
The former President advised that an important objective should be to avoid situations in which ‘children are giving birth to children.’ Infant deaths can be reduced by preventing unwanted and too-early pregnancies in cases where girl-children may not be mature enough to look after themselves or their babies. Girls need to be educated to understand the preventive measures they could adopt.
Infant deaths can be reduced measurably with the current budget of about $85 billion for the Public Health Service, a primary health care plan that provides the care that women and children need during and after pregnancy and the political will of state officials. These require, above all, a national primary health care policy aimed at improving conditions and enhancing the commitment to primary care. He proposed an approach through which a national maternal health service would emphasise the employment of professional personnel who are respectful of the rights and needs of expectant mothers; the execution of public policies to improve access and universal coverage in maternal and sexual and reproductive health; the extension and enhancement of village or ‘neighbourhood’ maternal clinics; the expansion of maternity wards in the new hinterland regional capital towns – Bartica, Mabaruma, Mahdia and Lethem and the erection of maternity clinics and health centers in coastland and hinterland villages to save women from having to travel long distances to access care.
President Granger reminded that the state had a duty to ensure that pregnant women everywhere –whatever their economic or social status or wherever they live – should be able to rely on a maternal health service based on a primary health care policy so that they can give their babies the safest start in life without the risk of death on the day of their birth. 󠄀
