Years ago, a social scientist professor who came from Japan was shocked when he met a family with 15 children in a village in Van, and after saying "leave me alone, I have short-term depression"he went into a room. He had shut himself off for 15 minutes. I know that if the same professor had visited a few more villages, he would have fallen into a depression that he would not be able to recover from for the rest of his life.
Family planning and population policies are directly related to the sociocultural, economic and educational level of the society. Today, many economically developed countries are trying to develop policies to reduce the rate of elderly population and prevent population decline. Since Türkiye has these examples in front of it, it should have very rational population policies. Neither very strict population policies should be implemented nor Japanese professors should be depressed.
As there are socio-cultural, educational and economic gaps in our country, there are also gaps in terms of family planning understanding. In addition, in rural areas, having "many children" is still considered a social and economic power. In this case, the number of children expected by families increases, the fertility rate increases, the period between two pregnancies shortens, and pregnancies over the age of 35 increase. However, unplanned and excessive fertility are the main reasons for an unhealthy society. Births at short intervals, young and older pregnancies bring about serious health problems.
The high child population is in the grip of lack of education and poverty. Lack of education is the main obstacle to healthy living awareness. Lack of education encourages excessive fertility, and excess fertility encourages lack of education. This vicious circle needs to be broken in the education aspect. It has been observed that as the education level of women increases, awareness of "Family Planning" increases. In our country, the number of children that university graduate women have is 1-2, while this number is 5-6 for illiterate women.
On the other hand, it is the natural right of every family to have as many children as they can care for whenever they want. Family planning “Families should have as many children as they want, whenever they want, and as many as they can care for” It is defined as follows. The aim of family planning is to ensure that the mother and the unborn baby are healthy and to raise healthy children. Because uncontrolled, successive births and miscarriages seriously threaten the health of mothers and children. Family planning services do not mean limiting the number of people in the family, not having children, or reducing the population. In fact, one of its purposes is to help and guide families who do not have children.
Benefits of family planning for family and society;
1.Preventing Excessive Fertility.
A high number of births impairs the health of mother and baby. Especially after the 4th birth, the possibility of developing undesirable conditions and the risk of death of the mother and baby increases. The death of the mother is one of the biggest disasters that can happen in a home. This shakes all family members deeply.
2.Adjusting the Birth Interval
Frequent birth disrupts the mother's health. Even in the healthiest mother, there should be at least a 2-3 year period between births. Family planning is the best method to adjust the time between two births.
3. Raising Healthy Children
A family's greatest responsibility is to raise their children healthy and secure their future. If a family has enough children to care for, it will better meet their material and spiritual needs. In other words, with the family planning method, physically and spiritually healthy children are raised in the society.
4.Creating a Healthy Society
Rapid population growth has a great negative impact on economic development. Family Planning slows down the rapid population growth and improves the education, nutrition, housing and environmental conditions of the society. As a result of all these, a healthy society is created by improving the quality of the population.
5.Reducing Risky Pregnancies
Births before the age of 20 and after the age of 35 are risky for the mother and the baby. Especially in births after the age of 35, the chance of giving birth to disabled and diseased babies increases, and premature birth and low-weight baby births increase. Family planning aims to protect maternal and child health by preventing these risky pregnancies and reducing the infant mortality rate.
Another benefit of family planning studies is to help and guide families who do not have children and to enable them to benefit from medical facilities.
7.Preventing Unintended Pregnancies
Unwanted pregnancies are often terminated by abortion or miscarriage. Miscarriages that endanger the health of the mother can even lead to maternal deaths, especially when performed under unhealthy conditions. Family planning prevents unwanted pregnancies, enables spouses to decide when to have children and reduces the rate of abortion.
Insufficient education level and low literacy rate in rural areas lead to insufficient awareness of healthy living. Women do not have sufficient knowledge about human health and especially preventive health services. Therefore, the number of women who want to benefit from these services is low. This deficiency is especially evident in the use of Family Planning and contraceptive methods. The proportion of women who do not want children is much higher than the proportion of women who use a modern method of birth control. In addition, false beliefs about modern contraceptive methods (causes cancer; infertility, weight gain, headaches, etc.) prevent these methods from becoming widespread. The rate of women using modern contraceptive methods for family planning purposes throughout our country is quite low.
According to TDHS (Turkish Demographic and Health Survey) data, approximately 71% of women While >% of them do not consider pregnancy, only 43% of them use modern contraceptive methods. With this rate, our country is behind countries such as Egypt, Zimbabwe, Tunisia and Bangladesh. While the number of illiterate women in Zimbabwe is 15%, this rate is 21% in our country. These data clearly show how important education is.
As a result, a healthy society consists of individuals who are spiritually, physically and socially sound. Providing these elements depends on certain economic opportunities and education. Families with more than enough children to care for are unfortunately unable to provide these opportunities to their children. It does not. For this reason, the State, especially non-governmental organizations, women's organizations and all segments of society have a responsibility to raise awareness of "Family Planning". Nor should we make the Japanese depressed.
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