The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) has approved an US$8 million loan for a program to help reduce maternal, perinatal and neonatal deaths in Guyana.
This program, IDB in a release said, seeks to improve the quality of care at 140 health facilities and in 88 communities, benefiting at least 140,000 women and 9,000 newborns per year.
According to the IDB, despite achieving progress during the last decade, Guyana continues to experience one of the highest maternal and infant mortality rates in Latin America and the Caribbean, “with a maternal mortality rate estimated at 121 per 1,000 live births and an infant mortality rate at 22 per 1,000 live births.”
“Given that about 93 per cent of deaths in children less than one year of age occurred in the neonatal period, the program will support and improve maternal and child health care with a focus on improving access to quality neonatal health services and providing a better path to and quality of reproductive and maternal health services” the development bank outlined.
The IDB says this operation will draw from their experiences with the Mesoamerican Health Initiative and incorporate lessons learned on evidence-based biomedical and operational interventions. It will also closely monitor results to ensure that those interventions can contribute to the success of the program.
The total cost of the project is US$8 million and will be financed as follows: US$4 million from the IDB’s ordinary capital resources and US$4 million from the Fund for Special Operations (FSO) of the Bank. The loan from the Bank’s ordinary capital has a six-year grace period and a 30-year term. The FSO funding has a term of 40 years with a 40-year grace period and a fixed annual rate of 0.25 percent.
