Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN)

This article, published by Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN), discusses the issue of women in Ghana attending prayer camps instead of visiting hospitals during pregnancy and childbirth. This is partly due to financial or health service access constraints, but in some areas pregnancy is viewed as a spiritual rather than a physical phenomenon, and people therefore choose prayer over a hospital when things go wrong. According to the article, only 35% of all deliveries in Ghana are supervised by a qualified medical practitioner. The remaining 65% either deliver at home or seek traditional help.

The article talks about the Ghana Health Service (GHS) and the work they are doing to increase the number of deliveries supervised by qualified health professionals. The GHS has set up a task force to try to increase the percentage of women attending health services to 70%, which is roughly in line with the Millennium Development Goal to reduce maternal mortality rates by three-quarters. They are trying in increase awareness of a new policy that makes maternal care free in Ghana, as well as train spiritual leaders to become traditional birth attendants. However, the article states that the training sessions have met with resistance from spiritual leaders who are unwilling to change. The government had also worked with the police in the past to close the prayer camps but failed because of "entrenched beliefs" in the community.

UNHCR Refworld website on March 12 2009.