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News from 2022-07-07 / KfW Development Bank
Help for mothers and their babies
On 05 July, Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan ceremoniously opened the new maternity and infant clinic at the CCBRT hospital in Dar es Salaam in the presence of German Ambassador Regine Hess. On behalf of the German Federal Government, KfW Development Bank provided EUR 18.5 million in funding for construction and equipment, and numerous other partners and donors – as well as the Tanzanian Government - are also supporting the project. The new maternal and neonatal clinic is a 192-bed facility built in Dar es Salaam by CCBRT "Comprehensive Community Based Rehabilitation in Tanzania" as part of a public-private partnership with the Government of Tanzania.
The newly opened clinic in and around Dar es Salaam will primarily admit and care for pregnant women in foreseeable high-risk deliveries and emergency patients - especially women from poorer sections of the population who have no health insurance and could not afford private treatment; private patients are also welcome, however. Income from the clinic's private obstetric and gynaecological services will subsidise the care of poor patients. The facility has four operating wards and two treatment rooms, eight delivery rooms, 15 outpatient consultation rooms, a blood bank, a central sterilisation department and a laboratory. Services for the estimated 12,000 births per year include antenatal care, delivery and postnatal care for mother and child (up to six months).
Maternal and infant mortality rates in Tanzania remain high compared to neighbouring countries - especially in urban areas - and coverage of basic emergency obstetric and neonatal care is low: only 20 % of outpatient clinics and 39 % of health centres provide maternity services that can respond to all emergencies. In Tanzania, 11,000 women die each year due to complications during pregnancy and childbirth, and 66,000 babies do not survive the first month of life.
CCBRT Maternity & Newborn Hospital (MH) is integrated into the regional health system as a highly specialised referral hospital. The hospital will offer integrated services under a continuum of care model and will treat patients from the first antenatal visit through delivery and early motherhood. In addition, the hospital will be one of the largest specialist clinics in Africa for the surgical treatment of obstetric fistula, a condition caused by severe birth injury. "Kangaroo mother care" will be provided for low weight babies and premature babies.
Pascal Kanyinyi, Senior Project Coordinator for Health Projects at KfW's Tanzania office, was present at the ceremony: "This clinic was urgently needed. Now many more mothers and their babies will get the care they need and deserve."
