LOCAL authorities have defied a government directive to scrap maternity fees for pregnant women insisting that it was not economically viable, NewsDay has established.
FELUNA NLEYA
Pregnant women at Harare’s City Council clinics are still paying user fees despite the 2012 government’s directive to scrap maternity user fees in a bid to curb maternal mortality.
Several other local authorities, including Bulawayo, Mutare, Masvingo and Gweru, were still charging the user fees despite the high maternal mortality rate in the country.
Health and Child Care minister David Parirenyatwa said there was need for the scrapping of maternity user fees as most women lost their lives because they could not afford to pay.
“We have got a very high maternal mortality at 525 women dying out of 100 000 and one of the biggest causes is because women are required to pay for that service,” Parirenyatwa said.
“We would like to convince our country to pour money into that area so that nobody who is expecting should pay.”
Parirenyatwa said this after being told during a tour of Mabvuku Polyclinic that pregnant women still had to pay $25 even after the scrapping of the maternity user fees.
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But City director of health services Stanley Mungofa defended the $25 fee. He said council had no choice but to charge for maternity since they had not received any money from government.
“If a grant comes, we will be happy to remove the user fees,” Mungofa said.
“For now, we are not receiving any money, so we have no choice but at least to charge something to complement the services.”
He said the actual cost of providing the maternity services was $152. Mungofa said the $25 council was charging covered very little of the expenses that were involved.
Mungofa said expecting mothers paying $25 were not given any food at the clinic, save for tea.
“We feel that $25 is heavily subsidised by the council which gets money from rates and brings it to provide services at the clinics,” he said.
“We give them tea only and don’t provide them with any food, but as council, we are looking at the possibility of providing food for these women so that we do not have problems when they come.”
The Zimbabwe Health Demographic Survey 2010/11 says maternal mortality the ratio ranges from 778 to 1 142 deaths per 100 000 live births.
On the other hand, the World Health Organisation says maternal mortality in Zimbabwe is pegged at 960 deaths per 100 000 births.
Government gave a directive in June 2012 for all health centres to scrap maternity user fees in a bid to lower the maternal mortality rate.
