Impact of the Early Stages of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Coverage of Reproductive, Maternal, and Newborn Health Interventions in Ethiopia: A Natural Experiment
This article has been Reviewed by the following groups
Listed in
- Evaluated articles (ScreenIT)
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic and response have the potential to disrupt access and use of reproductive, maternal, and newborn health (RMNH) services. Numerous initiatives aim to gauge the indirect impact of COVID-19 on RMNH.
Methods
We assessed the impact of COVID-19 on RMNH coverage in the early stages of the pandemic using panel survey data from PMA-Ethiopia. Enrolled pregnant women were surveyed 6-weeks post-birth. We compared the odds of service receipt, coverage of RMNCH service indicators, and health outcomes within the cohort of women who gave birth prior to the pandemic and the COVID-19 affected cohort. We calculated impacts nationally and by urbanicity.
Results
This dataset shows little disruption of RMNH services in Ethiopia in the initial months of the pandemic. There were no significant reductions in women seeking health services or the content of services they received for either preventative or curative interventions. In rural areas, a greater proportion of women in the COVID-19 affected cohort sought care for peripartum complications, ANC, PNC, and care for sick newborns. Significant reductions in coverage of BCG vaccination and chlorohexidine use in urban areas were observed in the COVID-19 affected cohort. An increased proportion of women in Addis Ababa reported postpartum family planning in the COVID-19 affected cohort. Despite the lack of evidence of reduced health services, the data suggest increased stillbirths in the COVID-19 affected cohort.
Discussion
The government of Ethiopia's response to control the COVID-19 pandemic and ensure continuity of essential health services appears to have successfully averted most negative impacts on maternal and neonatal care. This analysis cannot address the later effects of the pandemic and may not capture more acute or geographically isolated reductions in coverage. Continued efforts are needed to ensure that essential health services are maintained and even strengthened to prevent indirect loss of life.
Article activity feed
-
-
SciScore for 10.1101/2021.08.24.21262554: (What is this?)
Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.
Table 1: Rigor
Ethics Consent: Ethical approval: Women provided oral consent to participate at the initial household screening and prior to enrollment in the panel survey for all eligible women.
IRB: All procedures were approved by both the Addis Ababa University [075/13/SPH] and Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health [00009391] Institutional Review Boards.Sex as a biological variable Data source: Data for this study come from the Performance Monitoring for Action (PMA) Ethiopia survey, a survey project comprised of an annual nationally representative cross-sectional survey, a panel survey following women from pregnancy through one year, and an annual Service Delivery Point (SDP) surveys. Randomization not … SciScore for 10.1101/2021.08.24.21262554: (What is this?)
Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.
Table 1: Rigor
Ethics Consent: Ethical approval: Women provided oral consent to participate at the initial household screening and prior to enrollment in the panel survey for all eligible women.
IRB: All procedures were approved by both the Addis Ababa University [075/13/SPH] and Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health [00009391] Institutional Review Boards.Sex as a biological variable Data source: Data for this study come from the Performance Monitoring for Action (PMA) Ethiopia survey, a survey project comprised of an annual nationally representative cross-sectional survey, a panel survey following women from pregnancy through one year, and an annual Service Delivery Point (SDP) surveys. Randomization not detected. Blinding not detected. Power Analysis not detected. Table 2: Resources
No key resources detected.
Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).
Results from LimitationRecognizer: An explicit section about the limitations of the techniques employed in this study was not found. We encourage authors to address study limitations.Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.
Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.
Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.
Results from rtransparent:- Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
- No funding statement was detected.
- No protocol registration statement was detected.
Results from scite Reference Check: We found no unreliable references.
-
