Katswe Sistahood, a feminist organisation fighting for the full attainment of Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR) by women and girls in Zimbabwe Joined the world in commemorating World Contraception Day on 27 September, 2023.
By Nthokozo Gudu
The commemoration even was held in Epworth and brought together young women and girls and different service providers in the Sexual Reproductive Health and Rights in Zimbabwe. World Contraception Day takes place on September 26 every year,the commemorations by Katswe Sistahood’s mission was to improve awareness of all contraceptive methods available and enable young women to make informed choices on their sexual and reproductive health.
Speaking at the celebrations, Katswe Sistahood Senior Programs Officer Otilia Chinyani highlighted the importance of commemorating World Contraception Day as it educates girls and young women to realise bodily autonomy.
In our work that we do, the target is on women and we have realized that there is high incidents of unwanted pregnancies as well as teenage pregnancies. Upon further research we found out that there are a lot of barriers to access of information and services particularly looking at young women and girls , so commemorating this day is also acknowledging the importance of educating and ensuring access to information, sexual reproductive health and rights,” she said.
Chinyani also indicated on the linkage between World Contraception Day and International Safe Abortion Day as the lack of education on contraceptives usually leads to abortions by women.
“We realized that there is a link between the lack of access to SRHR information and high incidents of unsafe abortions so through this convening we are not only able to give them information on how to prevent unwanted pregnancies but we have also partnered different service providers to ensure that the young women also have access to contraceptives as well as information around unwanted pregnancies which leads to high increases of unsafe abortions.”
The celebrations focused on group discussions around SRHR information and access to contraceptives. There were also conversations that were held around empowering young women and girls about reproductive health and family planning.
Different service providers were present offering services on contraception , Population Service Zimbabwe educated the women on the different methods of contraception and also the Friendship Bench Zimbabwe which highlighted on the issues to do with mental health.
“Majority of the population present today are young mothers hence the need to educate them on depression ,in terms of contraceptives one might not be able to recognize the dates that they are due and sometimes not taking contraceptive pills because of depression so those are some of the areas that we are targeting today hence offering counselling to the women present today,” Youth Friendship Bench Manager Mary Munetsi said.
“We are screening for depression to see if one is depressed or not ,and also correcting the misconceptions around mental health issues specifically depression,” she said.
