The proportion of currently married women who are currently using any method of contraception rises with age from only 10 percent among women age 15-19 to 48 percent among age 35-39. The use of contraception then declines for women who are 40 years and above. The most popular method among women under 35 years is condoms, followed by the withdrawal method; among women age 35 and above, female sterilization is the most widely practiced method.These low levels of contraceptive use among younger women, in particular, are somewhat at odds with the survey finding that men and women alike are interested in at least delaying, if not avoiding, additional births. This suggests that there is a nearly classic case in Pakistan of an unmet need for birth control. This is typically the result of governmental ambivalence, if not antagonism, to the provision of fertility control methods.
The UN medium variant projections suggest that Pakistan will add more than 80 million people between now and 2050, whereas the high fertility projection suggests the addition of 120 million, but even that high variant assumes lower fertility than was found in the latest DHS survey. Back to the drawing board, I think. The future is going to be a bit different than we thought.
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