Beware Of The Explosion In The Birth Rate Due To The COVID-19 Pandemic

JAKARTA - The National Population and Family Planning Board (BKKBN) noted a decline in participants in the Family Planning program during the COVID-19 pandemic. In the February-March period, the decline began to occur, while in the following months the figure decreased more drastically.

BKKBN noted that there were 427,133 users of contraceptives in the family planning program in February. This number then decreased in March to 419,741 people. Furthermore, in April this figure fell to 267,132 people.

The Head of BKKBN, Hasto Wardoyo, revealed that this decline was a problem in their services during this pandemic. So that the decline in participants in this program continues.

"There has been a decrease in KB acceptors or those who inject, who take pills, and so on, both in the long and short term," he said during a Webinar, Tuesday, June 30.

Seeing this situation, Hasto explained his strategy in preventing the birth rate boom or baby boom during the COVID-19 pandemic. One of them is by distributing contraceptives for free to the public.

This distribution, he continued, was carried out by building a free distribution of contraceptives involving Family Planning Extension (PKB) and Family Planning Field Officers (PLKB).

"We really checked all the way to the corners. We checked and I'm sure it's enough for now," he said.

To prevent population explosion due to disruption of health services, the BKKBN also distributed 32,000 personal protective equipment (PPE) to village midwives.

This division, said Hasto, cooperates with the Indonesian Doctors Association (IDI) and has been implemented since March 2020 or when the transmission of COVID-19 occurred in Indonesia.

Another step, is to launch a family planning program simultaneously a million family planning acceptors or participants in a day. The launch was carried out on Monday, June 29, which coincided with the National Family Day.

Lastly, BKKBN also makes massive information services for family planning or massive family planning information. "Hopefully it can be for the sake of branding power equity (brand strength) in Indonesia based on independence and mutual cooperation," he concluded.