Achievement of gender equality
is one of the greatest challenges that the world faces as a majority of the
world population comprises of women. Women’s health is a global challenge
especially in the developing countries where poverty levels are high and
awareness levels low. A large majority of girls are not enjoying their rights in
Pakistan as their lives remain under great threat right from the time of her
conception. It is a common practice to abort a female fetus at early stages of
pregnancy as the need for male heirs and the prestige attached to a male child
is far more than that of a female child. Society at large limits opportunities
thus making life more difficult in comparison to a male.
The fact that there is no access to playgrounds and limited involvement in
social functions and other community activities as compared to their male
partner, women are more prone to develop psychological and physical ailments.
Their lives are restricted between four walls to protect them from society and
its piercing gaze. This retards their mental and intellectual growth and thus
makes it easy to silence their voices lest they develop opinions of their own.
Further, a large number of girl children are forced to marry without considering
their consent, liking and disliking. Many incidents have been seen where girl
children are sold, bartered and given as compensation to resolve family and
tribal feuds. These orthodox patriarchal practices are still in vogue in
Pakistan in this era of post-modern advancement. Girls are killed for exercising
their legal rights of marrying the person of choice, for voicing their thoughts
and wanting to pursue careers and studies. This myth of male dominance being
propagated for the betterment of women needs to be broken. For this purpose we
have to awaken women towards their own selves so that they realize that they too
are as much human as the males.
Women are being killed in the name of honour and family traditions. Prevalent
traditions, such as Karokari, Vana, Swara, Dundee, have reduced women’s status
in the society. Domestic violence is common and there is no help available to
those women who are victim of this kind of sub-human treatment. Acid burning,
gang rape and slavery of women are deep-rooted problems in our society. We were
informed by Edhi Centre that the newborn they receive in their center the ninety
percent of them are always female. This trend needs to be reversed. In this
backdrop, it isn’t a wonder that Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy a Pakistani journalist
and documentary filmmaker won an Academy Award for her documentary, Saving Face
in 2012 that revolves around acid attack victims.
Women face many challenges in the health sector as well where awareness
regarding general hygiene and health indicators is missing. This is worsened
with lack of proper infrastructure and poverty levels that make it difficult to
maintain healthy living conditions for them. Further, things are aggravated by
early marriages and childbirth issues.
Although huge amount of grant, loan and help from donor agencies in previous
regimes have been given to improve the women health care in Pakistan, but
unfortunately, because of lack of political will and non-understanding of
existing healthcare system in the country nothing much could be changed. The
country needs a massive investment in the production of competent doctors and
midwives, maternity homes, availability of trained staff in secondary and
tertiary care centers in every area. In short, long term planning is required to
bring durable changes in health sector for women.
A large number of young adolescents face pregnancy and childbearing related
problems as quality of care and effective health services are not offered within
the realm of socio-cultural norms and affordable costs. According to a study, it
is said that women’s health is said to be at risk if she gives birth to a child
“too early, too late, or too frequently”. The socio-cultural norms in Pakistan
expose women to all of these risks.
One such social practice that is becomes a fundamental reason is early marriages
of daughters which, according to surveys is around 18 years in major urban
areas. The only means to reverse such trends is to educate girls. It has been
observed that with each increment in level of education, age at marriage is
delayed by one year or more. Overall, age at marriage for above secondary
education is four and a half-years higher (22 years) than for illiterate women
(17.7 years).
Further, regular and timely ante and postnatal care checkups are important to
safeguard the health of women and the child during and after pregnancy. It is
observed that a very small number of women receive ante natal care whereas an
even smaller number is provided with postnatal attention. In most cases younger
women do not get much postnatal care in comparison to those above 25 years which
can be attributed to the fact that older women already having children realize
the significance and the need for such care. Also, with age comes wisdom and
social barriers are reduced. However, it must also be noted that urban women
show much higher antenatal and postnatal care received than their rural
counterparts. Considering that majority of women in Pakistan are still
illiterate and live in rural areas, this increases the risk factor for women in
suffering from maternal infirmities. Educating women further helps in reversing
such hazardous practices and related risks.
Breast, cervical, ovarian and colon cancers are the leading causes of women’s
death in Pakistan. The Department of Health has no screening program to prevent
these cancers as very few trained surgeons are available to deal with early and
advanced cancers of women. Chemotherapy is extremely expensive and it is not
possible for poor women to afford this kind of expensive therapy. Radiation
therapy is available free of cost in government hospitals but they are
overcrowded with patients. The overburdened staff is not able to provide quality
treatment to every woman
Breast cancer is rapidly increasing in developing countries and the mortality
rate is higher in comparison to developed countries due the late stage diagnosis
and limited access to quality treatment. According to various studies in this,
it is seen that in Pakistan it is a general misconception that one should visit
a physician only in case of some ailment. Therefore people consider regular
health checkup as unnecessary requirement. Many cancers can be revealed on
routine checkups because in general population there is lack of understanding
about the seriousness of cancer symptoms at initial stages and this usually
results cancer diagnosis at late stages when the disease becomes incurable
According to experts, people should be given awareness about cancer prevention,
risk factors, importance of routine medical checkup for early detection of any
disease including cancer and availability of cancer treatments. Cancer awareness
programs are needed especially for rural population and electronic and print
media. Cancer hospitals, and cancer research centers can play a major role in
this regard.
The current regime has initiated many such projects in the health sector that is
working towards increasing education and awareness of females towards their own
affairs. Women are being empowered socially so that they can help themselves. I
personally believe that without empowering the women, their state of health can
never be improved.(Ends)