The NUMBER of unmarried women using contraceptives has decreased from 46 percent for the 2015/16 Survey to 36 percent for the 2022 Survey.

Health Minister Ummy Mwalimu said this during the launch of the important results of research on maternal and child health and malaria indicators in Tanzania for the year 2022.

He said that the results showed that among married women, the use of any modern method of contraception is almost the same as reported in the 2015/16 study.

He said that research has shown that 38 percent of married women currently use any method of contraception, including 31 percent who use any modern method and seven percent of women use the natural method of contraception.

However, women who are not married but have sex, the use of any modern method has decreased from 46 percent for the 2015/16 Survey to 36 percent for the 2022 Survey.

In addition, he said the infant mortality rate before reaching one year of age is 33 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2022 compared to 43 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2015/2016.

The infant mortality rate before the age of one month is 24 deaths per 1,000 live births.

The results also show that the percentage of women who attended pregnancy centers four or more times is high in the Dar es Salaam Region (90.2 percent), followed by Mjini Magharibi (86.5 percent), Kusini Unguja (84.1 percent) and Mtwara (82.5 percent).

The regions with the lowest attendance at pregnancy centers are Simiyu (36.0 percent), Katavi (41.6 percent) and Shinyanga (44.9 percent).