The DHS Program

N'Djamena, Chad. On Tuesday, December 6, 2005, the Minister of Economy, Planning and Cooperation of Chad, the Honorable Mahamat Ali Hassan, officially opened the Dissemination Seminar on the findings of the 2004 Chad Demographic and Health Survey (EDST-II). Overall, results show that the status of maternal and child health has not changed in Chad since 1996-97, when the first DHS survey took place in that country.

Calverton, MD. Knowledge and use of family planning have increased markedly in Ghana, and the country is well on its way to achieving the population policy goals set forth by the Ghanaian government. A trends report published recently by the MEASURE DHS project found that Ghana has now surpassed its goal of lowering the nation's total fertility rate to 5.0 children per woman by the year 2000, as it now stands at 4.4.

Calverton, MD. Seven percent of women in Cameroon are infected with HIV, compared with 4% among men, according to the latest Demographic and Health Survey (CDHS), conducted from February to August of 2004, the third DHS of its kind in this country.

Calverton, MD. Early marriage and childbearing remain major obstacles to further fertility decline in Bangladesh. More than half of women marry before age 15. This is the highest rate of early marriage in Asia and among the highest worldwide. Nevertheless, fertility in Bangladesh is now on the decline after a ten-year stagnation.

Calverton, MD. The CD-Rom assembles all information on female genital cutting (FGC) collected since 1989 under the DHS project, including: FGC chapters from final reports, survey questionnaires on FGC, text of FGC module currently used, and DHS publications on FGC, including a newly released comparative report. For a free copy of the CD, see the contact information below.