National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Survey (2001)
March 4,2002
Based on the 1997 national FP/RH survey, this survey was conducted by the Family Planning Commission in 31 mainland provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities from July to September 2001.Four types of questionnaires are designed respectively for residents, individuals, township FP service stations and village communities and contents include fertility, contraception and reproductive health conditions of people of childbearing age, FP/RH services provided by township (town, village) FP service institutions and community service. The number of women of childbearing age actually interviewed totaled 39,586 and 337 counties (cities/districts), 1,041 villages, 47043 households and 177,610 residents were involved. Results of the survey are as follows.
1.Basic facts
Of the 39,586 women surveyed, 29,512 lived in rural areas (74.6% of total) and 10,074 in urban areas (25.4%). In terms of regional distribution, 15,636 lived in eastern areas (39.5%), 12,600 in central areas (31.8%) and 11,350 in western areas (28.7%). In ethnicity, 35,800 were Hans (90.4%) and 3,786 of ethnic groups (9.6%). In marital status, 6,458 were unmarried (16.3%), 31,516 married for the first time (79.6%), 948 remarried (2.4%), 290 divorced (0.7%) and 374 widowed (0.9%). In educational level, 6,590 were illiterate or semi-literate (16.6%), junior high school (36.1%), 5,473 senior high school or equivalent (13.8%) and 1,919 college education and over (4.8%).
Compared to the 1997 survey, there was no big difference in terms of the distribution of women of childbearing age, ethnicity and marital status except for their educational level. The proportion of illiterate semi-literate women declined by 4.8 percentage points while that for women with junior high school education increased by 3.9 percentage points.
2.Fertility
The total fertility rate of Chinese women was still above the replacement level in 1990, standing at 2.29. Since 1991, however it began to decline below the replacement level. In China, the proportion of women giving birth after 35 years old is small. Therefore, the average number of children they have had basically represents their lifetime fertility. In 2001, the average lifetime fertility of women was 1.81 (1.98 in rural and 1.22 in urban areas).
Since the 1990s, the median age at childbearing of the Chinese women varied between 25.1-25.5 (25.5 in 2000); the median age at first birth ranged between 23.2-24.1 (24.1 in 2000) and the average age at first marriage between first marriage and first birth was 1.3-1.6 years and that between the first and second births increased from 3.0 years in 1991 to 4.1 in 1995 and 5.7 in 2000.
The sex ratio (defined as the ratio of males to females) at birth continued to rise. The sex ratio of the first birth was also on the increase, from 106 in 1990-1995 to 110 in 1996-2001.
3. Contraception and abortion
In 2001, the contraceptive prevalence rate of married women of childbearing age reached 86.9%. Table 1 shows the age-specific contraceptive rate.
Table 1 Age-specific contraceptive rate
The survey shows that long-acting methods still dominated the contraceptive methods used by most couples of childbearing age (see Table 2). For those who had ever adopted contraceptive measures, the decision on what kind of method to use was on most occasions made by the couple themselves or other family members rather than family planning workers (see Table 3).
Table 2 Composition of contraceptive methods
Table 3 Who decides what contraceptive method to use
Who makes the decision The couple and other family members Of which: the woman herself
Recommended by other people such as
Professionals, management and othersOf which: management
For couples who made the decision on their own or at the recommendation of family members, 27.9% had the decision. Table 4 shows the knowledge of women of childbearing age who had ever used contraceptives about the method they used.
Table 4 Knowledge of women of childbearing age who had ever
used contraceptives about the method they used
Level of knowledge Knew the possible side effects brought by the method Knew a little about the possible side effects Knew nothing about the possible side effects Knew it is inappropriate to use IUD when suffering from menorrhea Knew it is inappropriate to use IUD when having reproductive tract infections
Men’s awareness of participating in family planning/reproductive health remained low. Only 40.5% of the husbands had ever talked with their wife about contraception. A mere 2.4% of the husbands took part in FP/RH training activities while 79% never did.
Since the 1990s, the abortion ratio had been slightly increasing, from 0.30 between 1991 and 1995 to 0.34 between 1996 and 2000.
4. Reproductive health
The proportion of people of childbearing age receiving various reproductive health services was increasing (see Table 5). Since 2000, 42.8% of the women surveyed had received gynecological check-ups. Of these women, 20.8% were found to have gynecological diseases and 88% of them had received treatment.
Table 5 Reproductive health services received by
couples of childbearing age
Reproductive health service Pre-marital health check-up Pre-natal check-ups Delivery at health/FP service centers at all levels Take calcium while pregnant Take iron while pregnant Delivery with help of doctor or trained birth attendant
Of the women surveyed, 63.6% had heard of STDs. Of these women, 33.8% could identify two types of STDs, 24.8% could identify three while 15.1% none.
The survey also found that 72.7% of the women interviewed had heard of AIDs. Of these women, 90.8% knew it is infectious, of which 61.2% knew at least five ways to contract AIDs and 2.7% knew none. Only 3.1% of these women could identify at least five channels through which AIDs is unlikely to be transmitted.
5.Grassroots service network
The survey revealed that 93.5% of the townships/towns surveyed had FP service stations. 75.6% of these service stations had women’s examination room (with privacy) and bed and ultrasound scanning machine. In addition, 38.5% had an operation room, oxygen cylinder, transfusion system and first aid medications, beside those mentioned above.
In the townships/towns with FP service stations, there was an average of 3.4 technical service providers in each station and one FP technical service personnel for every 10,000 residents. In 2000, 37.9% of the service stations had provided services such as induced abortion, insertion or removal of IUD and male and female sterilization. Besides, 5.8% had rendered more services like early pregnancy test, pre-natal check-up, diagnosis and treatment of common gynecological diseases and treatment of infertility and STDs.
In rural areas, the township/town FP service stations provided 17.7% of male sterilization, 13.1% female sterilization, 39.1% IUD insertion and 26.2% Norplant insertion.
In addition, 80.1% of the villages surveyed had a FP clinic and 99.3% had at least one professional FP worker. There was on average one village-level FP worker for every 1,000 residents, 8.4% of them received primary education. The proportion of villages that were able to provide 1-2 and 5-7 types of contraceptives was 21.6%, 35.1% and 33.4%, respectively, while 9.9% could not provide any contraceptives.
6.Publicity and education
The survey indicated that 75.2% of the villages surveyed had a population center. In the past two years, 45,8% of women interviewees of childbearing age had received publicity materials about FP regulations and policies, contraception and birth control, health care in different stages of life, prevention and treatment of gynecological diseases and STDs/AIDS and so on. 75% had read the materials they received and 59.5% could understand the content and 39.5% could basically understand. In addition to this, 8.9% of the rural women surveyed had viewed video or VCD about family planning and reproductive health in the past year.
In terms of regional distribution, the proportion of people who had received FP/RH publicity materials in the past two years was 49.5%, 46.4% and 40.1%, respectively, for the eastern, central and western areas.
7.Others
The survey results show that families practicing family planning have enjoyed special privileges in various aspects but more needs to be done (see Table 6).
Table 6 Proportion of one-child families that
have enjoyed special privileges
Special privileges One-child allowance Attending school Medical insurance Parents'old age insurance
Allocation of homestead Reduction and exemption fromvoluntary labor Employment
People’s desires to have both son and daughter remained strong, as evidenced by the finding that 43.1% of the unmarried women surveyed expressed their desire to have two children, 81.6% of whom preferred a boy and a girl.
(Source: Dept. of Planning and Accounting,
State Family Planning Commission of China.)