New Study Explores Solutions to Postabortion Care Barriers for Young People in Togo

September 16, 2019Training health workers in Togo is creating higher-quality, youth-friendlier services, resulting in increased usage of modern contraception among young clients. Anew article by IntraHealth International’sStembile Mugore inGlobal Health Science& Practice explains how training health workers to provide adolescent-friendly postabortion care is increasing voluntary contraception use, reducing unintended pregnancies, and averting abortions and maternal deaths in the country.This training marks a change for medical services in Togo.Sixty-one percent of the Togolese population is under 25. For women in that category, the unmet need for contraception is extremely high (42% for ages 15–19 and 40% for ages 20–24), which leads to a higher risk of unwanted pregnancies, illnesses related to pregnancy or childbirth, unsafe abortions, and/or mortality.Postabortion care includes emergency treatment for abortion complications; access to voluntary family planning services; referrals for other reproductive health services; and community empowerment through community awareness and mobilization. But young women in Togo don’t often seek out such services after an abortion for various reasons, including bias and judgmental attitudes from health workers, parental consent policies, stigma, and social pressure to have children.Through our work on the Pathfinder International-ledEvidence to Action (E2A) project, and in tandem with Togo’s Division for ...
Source: IntraHealth International - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: Tags: Togo Evidence to Action (E2A) Project Family Planning & Reproductive Health Education Performance World Contraception Day Youth Source Type: news