Colombia launches large-scale birth control effort

 

Colombia's Congress this fall passed a law guaranteeing all citizens access to free contraceptive drugs and surgical procedures, including vasectomies and tubal ligations.

The benefits are only now filtering down to shanty neighborhoods such as this one in northeast Cali, where birthrates are among the nation's highest, particularly among teenagers, health officials here said.

"The law is a real accomplishment and is already creating a lot of demand," psychologist Maribel Murillo said in her office at the Diamante health clinic, not far from shacks made of boards and plastic sheeting. "It will advance the sexual rights of women of little means, many of whom already have several children."

 

Zika affecting birth rates

 

Colombia's president said the other day that there were no signs of brain birth defects involving nearly 3,200 pregnant women in that country who were infected with the mosquito-borne virus.

This, of course, would be good news, given that unborn babies are assumed to bear the primary risk from Zika.

 

But major public health institutions -- including the World Health Organization, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the March of Dimes -- say it's too soon to tell whether the Colombia reports are accurate.

 

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos stated last Saturday that there's no evidence Zika has caused any cases of microcephaly in his country, though 3,177 pregnant women have been diagnosed with the virus.

Officials in Latin America and the Caribbean have warned women to avoid pregnancy amid an outbreak of the mosquito-borne Zika virus, which can cause severe birth defects. Rights groups have hit back, saying women often have no choice about pregnancy.

Infants are most at risk from the Zika virus, as mothers can pass the infection on to their fetuses, leading to microcephaly, a rare neurological disorder in which babies are born with abnormally small heads and developmental delays.