Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Modern Research in Social Sciences
Year: 2024
DOI:
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Under-Registration, Citizenship and Inclusive Policies in Honduras
Dr. Cristina Gomes
ABSTRACT:
This essay examines the relationship between access to health services and birth registration in Honduras, highlighting how increased healthcare coverage can reduce birth under-registration. In January 2014, the Ministry of Health and the Civil Registry implemented a hospital registration system, whose main action was the installation of civil registry offices in public maternity wards across the country to ensure thUe immediate registration of newborns. A statistical model was applied in the population census 2015 to analyze the factors associated with the under-registration, complemented with interviews with government officials about the main barriers in the process of registering children. Despite persistent challenges in the health system, by 2019, 94% of births took place institutional settings, but only 50% of newborns were registered at this stage. This is due to various barriers limiting access to civil registry, mainly in health services in maternity wards, as well as other ethnic-racial and rural barriers, which underscores the need for more inclusive public policies to ensure universal access to birth registration.
keywords: Right to identity, Human Rights, Civil Registry, birth under-registration, health, institutional births