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Mother and child life savers graduated

Kabul, August 27, 2008

With 1,600 deaths for every 100,000 live births Afghanistan has the second worst maternal mortality rate in the world. Especially in the rural areas, with bad road conditions and lack of transports, a pregnancy that goes wrong can be life threatening for both mother and child.

Wednesdays graduation of 23 midwifes in Wardak, a remote province in the central of Afghanistan, is therefore an important step towards decreased child mortality.

–By having trained midwifes in the rural areas, day and night, our children and mothers will have a better chance of survival if encountered problems during pregnancy, says Mr. Enayatullah Mayar, the deputy project manager for Swedish Committee for Afghanistan (SCA) in Wardak.

The midwifes and their trainers were honoured by the Governor of Wardak, the Provincial Director of Health and members from the provincial council. In the Governors speech he emphasized the need for continuous health education and also thanked SCA for its long lasting support in this issue.

The selection of students has been done in close cooperation with the local shuras. After graduation the students will serve their communities.
In Wardak and Paktika province alone the graduation adds the number of trained midwifes to 63. All together SCA has trained a total of 126 midwifes, and the next batch for the midwife training is being recruited.

The training is implemented by Swedish Committee for Afghanistan and funded by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida).