New study: 46% of Women in Uganda say they had unintended pregnancies in 2021

Women in Uganda continue to report high levels of unintended pregnancies. Results from Phase 2 cross-sectional survey of the Performance Monitoring for Action -PMA Uganda project at Makerere University School of Public Health (MakSPH) show that 46 percent of pregnancies in 2021 were unintended.

Of the 2,159 women of ages 15-49 from across the 141 enumeration areas (villages) in 15 sub regions of Uganda interviewed by the study team, at least 54% said their current/ recent pregnancy was intended.

The women were asked whether they were pregnant by intention of their most recent birth or current pregnancy. 33% said they wanted a pregnancy later while a total of 13% said they wanted no more children but ended up getting pregnant.

The proportion of those who had unintended pregnancy varied from the those that were in urban and rural areas. For instance, a whopping 48.5% of those who had unintended pregnancies were rural based women while 35.9% were in urban areas.

Also, results show that more than 50% of women who said they never wanted to be pregnant or wished to delay child birth were aged 35 and above. A higher proportion (more than 60%) of women who experienced unintended pregnancy in 2021 were teenagers aged between 15 and 19.

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