Onus of contraception still on women, NFHS-5 figures show

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 1

Context:

According to the latest National Family Health Survey-5 (2019-21), less than one in 10 men use condoms in India, while nearly four in 10 women undergo sterilisation to avoid pregnancy, which also shows that female sterilisation continues to be on the rise.

Key Findings

• Only 9.5% of men used condoms but 37.9% of women underwent sterilisation, according to the NFHS.
  • Though condom use in urban India is better than rural parts, the overall trend is vastly similar — 7.6% men in rural India and 13.6% men in urban India use condoms, while 38.7% women in rural India and 36.3% in urban India underwent sterilisation.
• Female sterilisation has gone up for the entire country from 36% in NFHS-4 (2015-16) to 37.9% in NFHS-5.
• In 19 of the 36 States and Union Territories, female sterilisation increased in NFHS-5 from that of NFHS-4. The rise was more than 5 percentage points in 11 States and UTs.
• The States with the highest increase in female sterilisation were Bihar (14.1% points to 34.8%), Goa (13.6% points to 29.9%) and Madhya Pradesh (9.7% points to 51.9%) .
• In 23 of the 36 States and UTs for which data were available, condom use was less than 10%. The State with the highest condom use was Uttarakhand (25.6%) and the Union Territory Chandigarh (31.1%).
• The silver lining, however, is that use of condoms has gone up between the two surveys — from 5.6% to 9.5%.
• The refusal to use condoms is not due to lack of awareness — NFHS-5 data shows that 82% men were aware that consistent use of condoms can reduce the chance of getting HIV/AIDS.
• Studies, however, show that promotion of condoms for protection from HIV/AIDS creates confusion in their acceptance among married couples.

Many stereotypes

• Condom usage is also low because family planning is considered the responsibility of women. For men, sex stands purely for pleasure. For women, it is often either about procreation, or involves the fear of getting pregnant. Men also believe that condoms reduce pleasure.
• Male sterilisation’s share in family planning methods has always been extremely low, despite the fact that it’s safer, quicker and easier.
• People believe that it can affect their virility and weaken them physically, rendering them unfit to work. These are myths and misconceptions that need to be addressed.
• Female sterilisation is also the preferred choice of contraception over methods such as pills (5.1%), injectables (0.6%) and intra-uterine devices (IUD) and post-partum intra-uterine devices (2.1%).

Family planning initiatives in India:

• Coercive policies: Between 1975 and 1994, family planning workers had targets they were expected to meet regarding sterilisations, condom distribution and intrauterine device (IUD) insertion which led to explicit or implicit coercion.
  • Following the Cairo conference on Population and Development in 1994, these targets were abandoned.
• Punitive policies include denial of maternity leave for third and subsequent births, limiting benefits of maternity schemes and ineligibility to contest in local body elections for individuals with large families. These policies were mostly ignored in practice.

The Hindu Link:

https://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/onus-of-contraception-still-on-women-nfhs-5-figures-show/article37763088.ece

Question- Population control needs emphasising adoption of male contraception on equal levels as female contraception. Explain.