MAPUTO, Sept. 27 (Xinhua) -- Nearly 900,000 women have joined family planning services since the beginning of this year, the Mozambican Ministry of Health said on Wednesday.
According to Pascoa Waty, head of the ministry's Department of Women and Children's Health, the number is expected to reach two million women aged between 15 to 49 years by the end of the year.
"These numbers will strengthen the work of the Ministry of Health in birth control and reducing early pregnancy. We are also working to improve the distribution and access of contraceptives that is still scarce for women with limited resources in our country," said Waty.
Health Ministry surveys indicated that by 2015 only 28 percent of women aged between 15 and 49 years in Mozambique used contraceptive methods.
"The campaign for the use of contraceptives is also a way to reduce the HIV/AIDS rate that tends to rise in the country," she said, noting that risky sexual behaviors still persist.
The prevalence rate of HIV/AIDS in Mozambique rose from 11.5 percent in 2009 to 13.2 percent in 2015.
