TO IMPROVE the health condition of pregnant women in Quezon City, the QC government has given free health insurance coverage through the Philhealth, to some 200 pregnant women in two barangays in the city.

The distribution of QC-sponsored Philhealth cards is part of the drive of QC to watch over the health of expectant mothers, especially the indigent ones.

With the number of women dying of childbirth unabated, the insurance serves as an intervention to maternal deaths by providing health benfits such as maternal health care package which includes free pre- and postnatal check-ups, birth planning seminars, and free child delivery in public and accredited private hospitals.

As indicated in the city’s poverty profile, about 1.8 percent of women in QC die each year from childbirth or in other pregnancy-related causes. This prompted the city government to launch efforts to strengthen the delivery of maternal health care services, like compliance to four pre-natal visits, provision of tetanus toxoid, laboratory screening, micronutrient supplementation, nutrition assessment, and breastfeeding education.

Of the 200 beneficiaries, 101 indigent pregnant women were from Barangay Pansol and 97 others, from Barangay Tatalon.