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POPCOM to strengthen advocacy on family planning to decrease fertility rate in Western Visayas

ILOILO CITY, Jan. 3 (PNA) -- The Commission on Population (Popcom) in Western Visayas will strengthen its advocacy on family planning to decrease the fertility rate in the region this year.

Popcom-6 Information Officer III Roilo Vincent Laguna, in an interview on Tuesday, pointed out that the region has 3.8 fertility rate in 2013 based on the results of the National Demographic and Health Survey (NDHS).

With this, he said that Western Visayas is among the top three regions in the country with highest fertility rate, along with Bicol region, which has 4.1 fertility rate, and the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) with 4.2 fertility rate.

Women of reproductive age, which is 15 to 49 years old, in the region have an average of three to four children.

“We will strengthen our advocacy through conducting responsible parenthood and family planning classes in barangays,” he said.

Laguna added that they will also focus on women with “unmet needs” or those women who do not have access to family planning services of the Department of Health (DOH).

As of 2015, Western Visayas had a total population of 7,536,383, including Bacolod City and Negros Occidental.

While the population in the country is projected to increase to 105 million, Laguna said that they are projecting an increase in the population in the region of 36,879 in the end of 2017.

Teenage pregnancy contributes to the increase in population. As of 2015, Popcom-6 recorded that in every 1,000 live births in the region, 23 were by teenagers.

A nine-year-old child is the youngest who got pregnant while a 12-year-old child is the youngest victim of maternal death in Western Visayas. (PNA)
LAP/PGL/CBFERRER/CBF

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