Over 2 million Zimbabwean women accessed modern contraception in 2025, helping to prevent an estimated 815 000 unintended pregnancies and 204 000 unsafe abortions, according to a latest report by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).
The contraceptives also helped to prevent 2 250 maternal deaths during the year, the report said.
Last year, Zimbabwe committed an additional US$2,25 million towards the procurement of contraceptives for 2026 and 2027 as part of efforts to strengthen family planning programmes.
Zimbabwe’s contraceptive prevalence rate remains among the highest in Africa.
A National Assessment on Adolescent Pregnancies in Zimbabwe report conducted by the Health and Child Care ministry in partnership with Unicef and Unesco showed that the country ranked third in Africa for contraceptive uptake, reaching 50,7 % in 2023.
According to the UNFPA Zimbabwe 2025 annual report, the milestone followed the Health and Child Care ministry’s rollout of the Community Health Equity Fund (CHEF) and the Contraceptive Cost Recovery Framework.
“The Ministry of Health and Child Care launched CHEF and the Contraceptive Cost Recovery Framework as landmark initiatives to boost domestic financing and secure the long-term availability of Sexual Reproductive Health commodities and essential services for vulnerable populations.
“The impact in 2025 was profound, approximately 2,23 million Zimbabwean women utilised modern contraception. This investment proved life-saving, preventing an estimated 815 000 unintended pregnancies, 204 000 unsafe abortions and 2 250 maternal deaths, highlighting the vital, cost-effective nature of investing in reproductive health,” the report read.
- In Full: Nineteenth post-cabinet press briefing: July 05, 2022
- Hesitancy slows Covid vaccination for children
- Hesitancy slows Covid vaccination for children
- Multisectoral COVID-19 messaging campaign improving prevention and vaccine uptake in Zimbabwe
Keep Reading
The report underlined that the nationwide scale-up of Sayana Press (a self-injectable contraceptive) successfully expanded self-care options, providing women with more accessible and innovative contraceptive choices.
UNFPA Zimbabwe country representative Miranda Tabifor said the organisation’s work continued to be guided by the goal of ensuring that every pregnancy is wanted and every childbirth is safe, with notable progress recorded across key indicators.
“In 2025 alone, UNFPA-supported family planning programmes reached a critical tipping point, averting an estimated 815 000 unintended pregnancies and 2 250 maternal deaths,” she said.
“These figures offer clear evidence of life-saving returns on sustained investment.”
Tabifor, however, warned that progress remains vulnerable due to declining global development assistance and persistent socio-cultural challenges.
“Our progress remains at a crossroads, a volatile global landscape marked by shrinking development aid threatens to erode our hard-won gains.
“Meanwhile, entrenched socio-cultural norms continue to fuel gender-based violence and a 23,7% adolescent pregnancy rate, leaving women and girls in Zimbabwe's most remote communities behind,” said Tabifor.
Looking ahead, UNFPA said its 2026 strategy would focus on consolidating gains and expanding impact.
Key priorities include strengthening maternal health interventions, improving supply chains for essential reproductive health commodities, scaling up the award-winning Not-In-My-Village campaign to combat adolescent pregnancy and child marriages, strengthening services for gender-based violence survivors through one-stop centres, and expanding youth-friendly health facilities providing integrated sexual and reproductive health and HIV services.
“UNFPA’s strategic outlook for 2026 will focus on using lessons from the eighth Country Programme to lay the foundation for the ninth Country Programme (2027-2031),” Tabifor said.
