HEALTH and Child Care minister David Parirenyatwa says he will engage Registrar-General Tobaiwa Mudede following his comments against the use of contraceptives amid an outcry over the implication of the statements.
FELUNA NLEYA STAFF REPORTER
Mudede was quoted urging the government to ban contraceptives, which he claimed had negative side-effects on women’s health.
According to State media, he claimed he had consulted medical experts who revealed that the use of contraceptives had harmful side-effects and hence should be banned in the country as they are also being rejected in other countries.
The Registrar-General claimed that contraceptives are killing productive women and affecting the country’s population growth.
But in an interview with our sister paper NewsDay, Parirenyatwa defended the use of contraceptives by women adding that one was free to choose a contraceptive which was suitable for her.
“For our policy we recommend on the use of contraceptives and women should use contraceptives to their suitability,” he said.
“There is an array of contraceptives and it depends with the ones which are suitable for the woman in particular.”
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“There are other ways of contraception like condoms, withdrawal method, oral contraceptives and these depend on what is suitable to one’s cycle.”
Parirenyatwa said some contraceptives are based on how long one would want to space their children.
“Unless our population policy changes, we still need the contraceptives, but if there is need then we will have to change policies together,” he said.
The minister said he would engage Mudede to try and understand his position on banning contraceptives in the country.
“I will engage vaMudede so that we talk and hear where he is coming from,” said Parirenyatwa who is also a qualified medical doctor. He added that some of the contraceptives were curative.
Other health experts criticised Mudede for advocating for the ban on contraceptives.
“We can’t (have a ban on contraceptives),” the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Health and Child Care committee chairperson Ruth Labode said.
“Contraceptives manage and control the family, they help a family to decide not to have babies close to each other and that way they are able to plan for their children on education.
“Family planning does not stop a family to have eight children, all it does is space them and one will be able to say I will not have a child for the next four years.
“We object that and it’s not going to happen as parliamentarians we will fight it.”
Labode said there were side effects, but different contraceptives, which people could use do not have side effects at all.
“Yes, there are side effects and there are a lot of different ways of family planning, all those side effects we had them during my time we used to bleed, but we continued on family planning because a time would come when it will stop,” she said.
“It’s not deadly. Family planning is one of the best strategies Zimbabwe has controlled its population with and at one time we were the best in the world.
“We need to maintain that because once you maintain that you will be able to look after that little baby. You cannot have them run around the six of them in this economy. We need our population like this, what was going to happen if we were going to be 30 million? We are fine as 13 million for now.”
Tinashe Mundawarara, the Programme Manager for the HIV, Human Rights and Law Project of ZLHR said Mudede’s comments were “unfortunate” and could result in serious consequences for the country.
“Comments by the Registrar General Tobaiwa Mudede are very unfortunate in that they are at cross purposes with our national public health goals that seek to promote choice in family planning and the use of contraceptives in stemming the advance of HIV and other STIs in our communities,” he said.
“Access to reproductive health services should not be driven by ideologies of senior government officials, but by sound policy that respects women’s reproductive autonomy.
“It is important for the ministry of Health to step in and counter this disinformation before it leads to grave consequences.”
