NAMPULA,
Mozambique
The Swedish Embassy in Maputo announced on Monday that it is providing additional funds of slightly more than a million US dollars to a project on expanding access by women and girls to safe abortion and to contraceptive care in the Mozambican provinces of Nampula and Zambezia.
The project was launched in 2016 with overall
funding of over five million dollars.
A press release from the embassy says the
additional million dollars is intended to extend the projetc, and to rise to
the challenge of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The embassy is working in partnership with
the Mozambican branch of the international health rights NGO, Ipas.
The Embassy release said the funding “is
intended to guarantee the implementation of activities inherent to sexual and
reproductive health and rights as a fundamental part of human rights”.
The focus, it adds, is on creating a
favourable environment for implementing Mozambican abortion legislation
“through actions of advocacy and publicising the law that de-penalised safe
abortion”.
The project intends to strengthen 20 health
units in Nampula and 20 in Zambezia so that they can offer safe abortion
services and high quality post-abortion care.
The release added that sexual health and
reproductive rights “are among the pillars of Swedish cooperation policy for
the development of Sweden’s feminist foreign policy.
Cited in the release, Swedish Ambassador
Mette Sunnergren said “the right to decide and exercise control over one’s own
body, sexuality and reproduction is fundamental for all people”.
“The reduction of unwanted pregnancies and of
maternal mortality depends on a functioning health system with comprehensive
services, including access to contraceptives and safe abortion”, she added.
Interesting courtesy meeting between Minister Maleiane and Ambassador Sunnergren and an opportunity to reaffirm the bilateral relations between Mozambique and Sweden.
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