Women urged to use clinics for birthing, family planning counseling in refugee camps along Somalia-Kenya border

IRIN examines how community health workers and international aid organizations, such as Medecins Sans Frontieres and the International Rescue Committee, are working to provide safe and adequate health facilities in refugee camps on the Kenya-Somalia border where women can give birth.

"Most of the 470,000 refugees in Dadaab are from Somalia, where about 80 percent of deliveries take place at home or with unskilled traditional birth attendants," according to the WHO, and where the maternal mortality rate is estimated to be 1,400 deaths for every 100,000 live births, IRIN notes. Women who visit the health clinics also seek family planning counseling, rape and post-abortion counseling and treatment, and screening for sexually transmitted infections, according to the news service (9/14).