Global health has improved considerably over the last four decades, however, in less developed countries modern contraceptive methods are used by only 43% of women of reproductive age leading to a major strain in the intractable challenge to combat population-level changes as well as the ability for these households to sustainably provide for the children they conceive.
Family planning is not just about controlling the number of children in a family, it’s a win-win for both health and wealth. The act of educating more and more people about safe family planning methods empowers them, especially the youth, with knowledge about safe family planning and access to services that not only improve health and well-being but also help avoid unwanted pregnancies, space births and give households the freedom of being able to fully take care of their families according to their means.
With Kenya’s bulging population, which is now at 48 million, it shows the great need to improve the country’s Contraceptive Prevalence Rate (CPR). The shift to modern methods of family planning has been a key highlight in the past 5 years when the UK Government, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation alongside the UNFPA and other partners held a summit that seeks to enable over 120 million more women and girls to have access to contraceptives by 2020.
According to Dr. Steve Kaliti, Deputy Head, Reproductive Health and Senior Deputy Director of Medical Services – Ministry of Health, in the last year alone, access to modern contraceptives prevented over 4,000 maternal deaths in the country. This milestone that has taken the health and development sector decades to reach is a step for the country in ensuring that access to a full range of quality and affordable contraceptives significantly reduces maternal and infant deaths and also significantly improves the health and economic stability of families.
Yesterday, DKT International, one of the largest private providers of family planning products and services in the developing world, unveiled a range of brands that would meet the unmet need for contraception and family planning services in the reproductive health sector in Kenya.
The products include condom brands Kiss and Fiesta, the Lydia brand family of women’s health and hygiene products, including Oral Contraceptives, Emergency Contraceptives, Intrauterine devices (IUDs) and injectables – Sayana Press and Kare brand family of products for clinical use that will be available in different, fun and high quality variants in very affordable prices that will meet the needs of consumers across all demographics.
Speaking at the launch, DKT managing director Mr. Colin Dick said that is has always been DKT International’s mission to provide safe and affordable options for family planning and HIV prevention and the move to launch the array of products will do so as well as leverage their marketing expertise to have educational campaigns about the safe use of their products which will soon be available in stores in Kenya and Uganda.
Here’s a brief overview of the newly launched products:
- Kiss Condoms: the Kiss condoms come in 3 different flavours:
- Classic condoms are transparent, vanilla scented and gently lubricated
- Strawberry condoms are red in colour are strawberry flavoured and ribbed for the woman’s pleasure and
- Chocolate ones which are brown, chocolate flavoured and dotted.
- Fiesta Condoms: these ones come in different flavours and variants. The three flavours are Strawberry, Chocolate and Max Dotted which is vanilla scented.
They also have the Stamina variants which are black coloured, dotted, vanilla flavoured and have a dash of benzocaine which delays climax for a longer and more intense experience with your partner.
The Big Black condoms are wider & longer for the more endowed gentlemen and gently lubricated. They also delay climax for maximum pleasure.
- The Sayana Press is a self-injection contraception that can be administered intra-muscularly and the Lydia Post Pill is an emergency contraceptive pill that once taken is effective for up to 72 hours of unprotected sex.
*Note that the Sayana Press should be administered only after seeing your doctor/gynaecologist and that the Lydia Postpill is not a daily pill, it’s only for emergencies. The Lydia oral contraceptives, however, can be taken daily to prevent pregnancy.
The condoms also come with an instruction manual of condom dos and don’ts & some very interesting ‘positions for the mission’, if you know what I mean.
