Right to Health of Internally Displaced Persons - IDP SriLanka

Nutritional status of pregnant women and lactating mothers
The nourishment of pregnant mothers is vital since it affects not only on
health condition of the mother but also on the child. The recommended
weight gain during the pregnancy is 10 Kg, but it is reported according to
National Nutrition Policy, 2007 the average weight gain reported in Sri
Lanka is less than 7.5 Kg. Despite the provision of iron, folic acid and
other vitamins by the health authorities through PHM, average anemia
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prevalence is being reported as 37 percent amongst pregnant women .
According to the data from DPDHS- Trincomalee, 2007, 5 percent of
pregnant mothers are suffering from moderate anemia and 1.33 percent
is suffering from severe anemia. It was also observed that while 87.3
Percentage of pregnant mothers were protected against the rubella in the
districts of Vavuniya, Trincomalee and Mannar, only 50 percent of them
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were protected .
Repercussions of above factors were greatly felt on the women of the
above conflict affected area it is evidenced by higher Maternal Mortality
Rates, low birth weigh rates reported in those districts. In 2005,
Batticaloa and Vavuniya reported 81.2 and 68.7 of maternal mortality
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rate per 1000 live births while national average is 38 . Low Birth Weight
rate was also reported in the district of Batticaloa, Puttalam and
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Anuradhapura as higher than national average and District like
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Batticaloa and Anuradhapura possess higher Infant Mortality Rate . In
Trincomalee, reported percentage of babies born with low birth weight
approximately was about 12.8 %( 971 out of 7587 births) in 2006 and in
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2007, it was 14.95% (964 out of 5457 births in June) . According to the
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Medical Research Institute, Ministry of Health Care Nutrition and Uva Wellassa
Development, UNICEF: Rapid assessment of coverage of micronutrient
supplementation in Sri Lanka,2004
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Vavuniya 50.9,Trincomalee 54.2, Mannar 45.6-FHB- 2005
FHB-2005, See theAnnexure VII
National- 16.9,Batticaloa 20.2, Puttalam 21.1,Anuradhapura 19.2- FHB-2004
National average- 11.2-per 1000 LB, Batticaloa 19.6, Anuradhapura 19.4-- Table
4.Vital statistics by District,Annual Health Bulletin, 2005
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See theAnnexure IX
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