Egypt's Birth Rate Highest In More Than 20 Years; Family Planning Disappearing From Public Policy

EDIT

The state’s formal role in family planning began in the 1960s under President Gamal Abdel Nasser. In the late 1970s, the United States Agency for International Development became the main supporter of family planning programs in Egypt, spending about $1.5 billion on population and other health programs over several decades. Efforts to rein in the birthrate intensified after 1994, when Egypt hosted an international conference on population and development.

Thousands of primary clinics were built around the country, providing family planning and other health services that were credited with decreasing the fertility rate as well as maternal and infant mortality rates. The outreach efforts of that period included advertisements on state television and banners on Cairo streets — with slogans like, “Before you have another baby, secure its needs.” Dr. Nahla Abdel-Tawab, the Egypt director of the nonprofit Population Council, said of the Mubarak years: “The president himself used to talk about population increases. It was in the newspapers, in the prime minister’s speeches.”

Now, population has seemed to vanish from public discussion. Health workers said they were stunned when Dr. Abeer Barakat, an assistant minister for health who is responsible for family planning, made no explicit mention at a United Nations conference in December of population or family planning in describing the Health Ministry’s priorities.

EDIT

And while she said that family planning programs would continue to be a part of health policy, she also said the government should play no role in encouraging families to limit the number of children they have. “Assigning a number is against reproductive freedoms, and against human rights,” she said. “They are not rabbits, to stop giving birth,” she said. “Manpower is a treasure.”

EDIT

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/03/world/middleeast/as-egypt-birthrate-rises-population-policy-vanishes.html?ref=population&_r=1&