KARACHI: The Pakistan Demographic and Health Survey (PDHS) report 2012-13, launched at a seminar on Wednesday, put forward some alarming statistics regarding the health of women and children.

Speakers at the launch stressed the need for putting up a fight with the recurring diseases and conditions in healthcare.

The PDHS was conducted by the National Institute of Population Studies (NIPS) with financial and technical aid from USAID. It is the third among the PDHS surveys.

The detailed report primarily focuses on inter-linked issues, such as, education, reproductive health, nutritional health of mother and child and infant mortality rate among others.

The statistical data, as mentioned in the report was based on one-on-one interviews held after surveying households in both rural and urban areas of Pakistan. The report is based on responses from 93 per cent of women and 79pc of men.

Starting off, neonatal mortality rate — meaning death of infants within the first month after birth — has remained unchanged for the past 20 years. Within the past five years, the neonatal mortality statistics have been 55 deaths per 1,000 live births. As a result of this persistent trend, one among 14 children dies before reaching the age of one year. Eventually, one among 11 does not live to see his or her fifth birthday.

During the interviews, two-thirds of women reported to have problems in accessing basic health facilities for themselves. The concerns circled around visiting the doctor alone and needing a male member to come along, lack of transportation or the distance it took to get to the facility.

As a result of these concerns, six in 10 women received a postnatal (after childbirth) check-up “within two days of delivery”, while one-third of women did not have a postnatal check-up within 41 days of delivery. During childbirth, around 41pc women had a “traditional birth attendant” with them.

According to the statistics covering trends in maternal health, 73pc of women received antenatal (before childbirth) care by a proper doctor. Meanwhile, 48pc of them delivered their child in a proper health facility.

As per the survey, 45pc of children under the age of five “are too short for their age indicating chronic malnutrition or stunted growth”. Also, 30pc of children are underweight “or too thin for their age”.

The report specifically mentions that birth intervals — at least 36 months — reduces the risk of infant deaths, as a child born less than two years after a sibling is more at risk of dying before turning five. In Pakistan, an average birth interval lasts 28 months. In more than one-third of cases, the survey reported that children were born less than two years after their sibling.

Rather than focusing on the symptoms, the report mentioned in detail the root causes of what had remained wrong with people and the government’s attitudes towards healthcare and education.

Lack of education and family planning had been a recurring issue year after year, said NIPS executive director Abdul Basit Khan.

A former special assistant to prime minister, Shahnaz Wazir Ali, said that the figures were there for all to see, “but we need to be realistic and focus on district-specific targets, which are easy to achieve, rather than global specific goals”.

She said that most of the work that needed to be done with regards to management and implementation of health services was a question of collaboration between various departments, specifically education, health and population.

Another factor that usually poses a threat to the health of women is their age while getting married.

Though accounts of women between the ages of 25 and 49 mentioned that they got married after turning 18, the report revealed that the basic age of getting married had increased to 19 .5 years in 2012-13.

Speaking about the age of marriage, Ms Wazir Ali remarked: “In recent years, the provincial assembly has made some bolstering social legislation for the cause of women, but its efficacy and implementation remains unresolved”.

Apart from the statistics on health, an entire chapter of the report was spared to gauge the attitudes of respondents towards spousal abuse. Around 43pc of the women said that a man was justified in beating his wife if she argued, neglected the children or refused sex with the husband.

Among the bevy of speakers who presented their ideas at the launch of the PDHS survey, there was a unanimous agreement that with the looming large presence of the millennium development goals, the need was more than greater to resolve the impending health issues.