The Women's Commission for Refugee Women and Children: Making Reproductive Health a Priority for Refugee and Displaced Women

Editor's Notes

• #20: This component of the Global Evaluation was undertaken by Sara Casey, Susan Purdin, and Therese McGinn, Heilbrunn Department of Population and Family Health, Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University
• #21: The purpose of the evaluation was to determine the current situation regarding RH services available to conflict-affected populations and to identify the gaps in service provision.
• #22: Countries with a minimum of 10,000 refugees or IDPs were identified and a questionnaire, posing questions about the RH services available to the refugee and IDP populations in a single settlement, was emailed to key informants in 73 countries in March 2003. The questions referred only to the availability of services, as quality of care and usage were beyond the scope of this evaluation. Key informants were followed up through email, phone and fax to collect completed forms and to clarify any missing or questionable information. OECD countries except Turkey and countries neighboring Colombia were excluded.
• #23: Some completed Forms B include one site per form as intended, but others include information from multiple sites on one form. One-hundred-and-eighty-eight questionnaires were received from refugee and IDP settings in 33 countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America, covering approximately 8.5 million displaced people (82% refugees, 18% IDPs), three-quarters (76%) of whom lived in camps, 6% in urban areas, and the remainder in non-camp settings.
• #25: More than two-thirds of sites (68%) had 2-4 elements of antenatal care (ANC), while 32% offered comprehensive ANC. Basic emergency obstetric care (EmOC) was available in 45% of the sites, while comprehensive EmOC was available directly or through referral in 39% of sites.
• #26: Nearly all sites reported offering at least one method of family planning with oral contraceptive pills (96%), condoms (95%) and injectable hormones (89%) the most commonly available methods.
• #27: Some aspects of HIV prevention were reported to be widely available, such as condoms (94%), the correct practice of universal precautions (90%), and community-based AIDS education (89%), while diagnosis and treatment of STIs were available at 85% of sites.
• #28: In over half of the sites, programs for the prevention (57%) and the response (59%) to gender-based violence were in place; community education and awareness-raising took place in 79% of sites, while psychosocial support and counseling were available in 64%. Additionally, in 60% of sites, emergency contraception was available to survivors of rape, and two in three (66%) sites had guidelines for medical personnel’s response to incidents of sexual violence, while one in three (33%) had such protocols for security personnel and protection officers (39%).
• #29: Although an attempt was made to gather information on RH services for refugees and IDPs in all countries that met the criteria for inclusion in the study, the analysis is limited to those sites for which a response was received. These data primarily cover refugees (82%) in camps (76%), and are not representative of displaced populations around the world.   This study addressed only the availability of RH services; questions about quality, detailed accessibility or usage, which are extremely important, were beyond the scope of the survey. Interpretation of the results should take into account the fact that just because services are available does not mean they are accessible, of good quality or that the population uses them.   Respondents were asked to mark ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ to a list of RH services available, either directly or through referral, in their site. Although this is relatively straightforward, some may have interpreted the questions differently and marked ‘Yes’ only to services available to a majority of the population or most of the time, while others may have indicated ‘Yes’ if the service was ever available at all.   Some countries host both refugees and IDPs. Although attempts were made to gather information on both populations, information about IDPs was often more difficult to access.   Population numbers gathered from UNHCR and the US Committee for Refugees differed in many cases from the numbers reported by the key informants on the ground. In Togo and Kazakhstan, for example, officials told us that the country has no refugee population, while the data indicated they had at least 10,000 people. Although numbers can change quickly in the humanitarian field, it is unclear why such large disparities exist, how the original numbers were calculated, and what is the reality.
• #30: The results represent a general overview of the availability of reproductive health care to refugees and IDPs around the world. Looking at the results by technical area, coverage of RH services appears to be fairly good. GBV is weak however, and other areas such as HIV/AIDS prevention and EmOC could (and should) be stronger. There is no excuse for less than 100% coverage on some services, such as antenatal care and EmOC.   Coverage decreases with the newness of the technical area. GBV, the newest, least familiar and most difficult area, has the lowest coverage, while antenatal care, the most familiar, most standard and easiest to provide, has the highest coverage.  
• #31: Despite some shortfalls, given the status of reproductive health for populations affected by armed conflict in the mid-1990s, the results are promising. Even if they overestimate care, it is clear that a wide range of sites and a meaningful absolute number of sites provide RH services. This is impressive especially given a starting point of few if any RH services available ten years ago.   Identifying the cause of the improvement in RH care from the mid-1990s to now was not a part of this study; however it may be reasonable to posit that attention to RH and the work of UNHCR, UNFPA, IAWG and member agencies was instrumental. The development of policies and guidelines may have been useful in expanding the provision of RH services to displaced populations. We know from program experience that attention must be maintained to keep services and quality high; therefore updating this database regularly is recommended.