Partners in family planning.

Studies of the Africa OR/TA Project and other Cooperating Agencies suggest that support of family planning by traditional health practitioners (THPs), traditional birth attendants (TBAs), Islamic religious leaders, and male opinion leaders (MOLs) can result in an increase in the availability of family planning services in the community. A study in Kenya shows that 100 trained THPs who were actively involved in family planning (i.e., distributors of condoms, oral contraceptives, and primary health care drugs) increased contraceptive use in Siaya and Kakamega districts from 7% to 15% and from 14% to 34%, respectively. Contraceptive use did not change in the 2 control areas. Two years after TBAs underwent training in family planning promotion, the proportion of women who named TBAs as their source of family planning information increased from 2% to 18%. In The Gambia, integration of Islamic religious leaders into family planning promotion activities resulted in an increase of current modern contraceptive method use from 9% to 20% for males and from 9% to 26% for females. Involvement of 69 MOLs has increased knowledge of family planning methods in Nkambe, Cameroon. For example, among males, knowledge about the condom increased from 52% to 81% and knowledge about spermicides increased from 12% to 44%. The corresponding figures for women were 47% to 72% and 17% to 42%, respectively.