The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Third world women more at risk of dying during pregnancy

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Mar 04, 2005

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Third world women more at risk of dying during pregnancy

By Our Staff Reporter

CHENNAI, MARCH 3. Infant mortality rate in India has decreased over a period of time. The latest figures show it at 68 per thousand live births, the Governor, Surjit Singh Barnala, said today.

Inaugurating the Srushti Hospital at Ramapuram here, he said that every time a woman in the third world was pregnant, her risk of dying was 200 times higher than the risk run by a woman in the developed world.

Even after birth, girls are less cared when compared to boys and by the age of five, female mortality exceeds that of males by 20 per cent in many States, including Tamil Nadu, he said.

Referring to the focus of the Srushti Hospital on infertility, the Governor said that infertility represented a major health and social problem.

"Many women are abandoned by their husbands, especially in rural areas due to their inability to bear children. This has major psychological and sociological implications both on the mother as well as on the society," he said.

S. Samundi Sankari, chairperson and managing director of Srushti Hospital, said that the focus would be on fertility, neo-natal intensive care, care of women on early detection of cancer and accident and trauma care. The other specialities, which include paediatrics, surgery and laparoscopy, will be made available.

She said that being in the field of infertility treatment for the past 20 years, the hospital has focussed on this speciality to help women suffering from the problem.

K.M. Marimuthu, former Vice-Chancellor, Bharathidasan University, Lalitha Ananthasubramanium, former Director of Medical Education, A. Krishnan, assistant general manager, State Bank of Mysore, and J. Prabhakar spoke.

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