India recorded 25% of Deliveries by Untrained Hands in 2010 as per India’s Sample Registration Data

According to the registrar general of India’s latest Sample Registration System (SRS) 2010 data, two in 10 women in India received medical attention by a qualified professional in 2010 while delivering at home.

It was noted that fewer women in urban India received medical attention while delivering at home than in rural India — 10.8% against 16.2%.

Nearly 1 in 4 births overall were attended by untrained functionaries. Delivery by untrained functionaries were found to vary from as high as 53.5% in Jharkhand to as low as 0.2% in Kerala.

More women were noted to have delivered in government hospitals (41%) as against private hospitals (19.4%). Kerala recorded the highest deliveries in private hospitals while Odisha recorded the least. Tamil Nadu recorded the highest number of women who delivered in a government hospital while Jharkhand recorded the least (19%).

55% of women in Delhi delivered in government hospitals while 23% went to private hospitals. 17% of births at home were carried out by a qualified professional.

Deliveries conducted by a qualified professional at home were as low as 4.5% in Maharashtra. Untrained functionary deliveries were as high as 47% in Bihar, 35% in UP, 25% in West Bengal and 27% in Madhya Pradesh.

Institutional deliveries (children being born in health centres or hospitals and not in their homes) were found to have picked up in India. As per the data released, more than three-fourths of deliveries in India were found to be occurring in institutional and by qualified professionals at present.

Several states recorded very low births by untrained functionaries. They include Kerala (0.2%), Tamil Nadu (0.9%), Andhra Pradesh (1%), Punjab (2.6%), Delhi (5.3%), Gujarat (8.8%), Haryana (6.3%) and Karnataka (9.3%). Rural regions in several states recorded high rates of delivery in private hospitals. Like Kerala, where 52% of births in rural settings took place in a private hospital, followed by 35% in Andhra, 23% in Delhi, 36% in Gujarat, 32% in Haryana, 20% in Karnataka, 36% in Maharashtra, 35% in Punjab and 24% in TN.

Deliveries Data

1 41.1% deliveries in India in 2010 took place in a govt hospital
2 19.4% happened in a private hospital
Only 15% women received medical attention by a qualified profession during child birth
One in four births happened in the hand of an untrained functionary

Comparing nearly 1.4 lakh deliveries between 1960 and 2000

The figures were arrived at after comparing nearly 1.4 lakh deliveries between 1960 and 2000. Scientists concluded following the comparison that the first stage of labour had increased by 2.6 hours for first-time mothers.

For women who had previously given birth, the early stage of labour took two hours longer in recent years compared to women in the 1960s. Infants born in the contemporary group were born five days earlier and weighed more than were those born in the 1960s. The women in the contemporary group tended to weigh more than those who delivered in the 1960s.

For women of more recent times the average body mass index (measure of body fat based on height and weight) before pregnancy was 24.9, compared with 23 for the earlier generation. At the time they gave birth, the mothers in the contemporary group were about four years older, on average, than those in the group who gave birth in the 1960s.

 As per the study by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) the BMI of an average Indian woman increased over the last 50 years on account of good nutrition, high fat diet and fast food. If an average woman in the 1960s had a BMI of 23, it is likely to be 27 in the present times.