World Population Day is being celebrated all over the world today. Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s population is estimated at 40 million and is expected to reach 58 million by 2050, according to the United Nations Population Agency. This number is highly alarming for a province capable of earning only six percent of the total budget.
In such a situation, social attitudes prove to be an obstacle to population control, instead of taking into account the health of women, a large number of men are supportive of outdated ideas that also lead to gender inequality.
According to the United Nations Population Agency, according to 2023 figures, the population of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is estimated at 40 million, which is expected to reach 58 million by 2050.
On the other hand, data from the National Nutrition Survey 2018 and the Pakistan Social and Quality of Life Measurement Survey 2019-20 tell us that about 1,900 mothers lose their lives during childbirth annually.
According to the survey, 53 out of every 1,000 children born die before the age of one. 23% of children under the age of 5 are malnourished.
Statistics seem to give us a sense of the seriousness of the issues but at the societal level it is negligible.
Speaking in this regard, a counselor from the health sector in Peshawar said that very few people take care of the woman, otherwise she is a bull of crusher.
Social attitudes, along with increasing aging, also limit gender inequality, women’s ability to make decisions about health and reproductive life, which is the need of the hour.
