In this largely Muslim population, onlyabout a third of women have any schooling, most marry young(nearly 80 percent by the age of 19) and by the age of 18,more than half have had their first child. Nearly 1 in every5 women joins in a polygamous marriage. As both women andmen state they want 8 and 16 children, respectively, the useof modern contraception remains strikingly low at 1 percentamong women and fertility is high. The objectives of thisproject are to: (a) enhance capability at the central levelto support regional health services (16 percent); (b) ensureaccessibility of the population to low-cost essential drugs(21 percent); and (c) improve access to basic healthservices in the regions of Guera and Tandjile (63 percent).While the scope of (a) and (b) are nationwide and supportcapacity building for health generally, (c) targets tworegions for the implementation of these efforts with anemphasis on Safe Motherhood. This project builds on a priorBank project that included support for the general healthsector, the Social Development Action Project (PADS). Tofurther support the nationwide health efforts, andspecifically the newly-adopted National Drug Policy (NDP),the Bank assists to ensure overall geographical as well asfinancial accessibility of the population to essentialgeneric drugs as a prerequisite to the successfulimplementation of cost-recovery. The NDP selects drugsessential for dealing effectively with at least 90 percentof the curative and prophylactic needs of the majority ofthe population, including the major complications that kill women.
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