It is estimated that over 28,000 Bangladesh mothers die during childbirth each year and over 375,000 become debilitated. These alarming figures have created concern about the strategic implementation of the pre- and neonatal services that are provided. Decreasing this figure is a major challenge that is being undertaken by the 4th Population and Health Project, a Consortium of 10 donors led by the World Bank. The country's overall economic portrait has neither improved nor worsened, and was not shown to have affected fertility rates. Despite recent improvements in women's autonomy and the trend towards delayed marriages, the social structure continues to be conservative, favoring males over females, restricting the opportunities of women, and relying on adult sons to take care of their aging parents.
Children continue to play a critical social and economic role.
In addition, child mortality is declining only gradually. What socioeconomic changes there have been are too recent to have had any significant effect on fertility reduction in Bangladesh. Bangladesh's Family Planning Program is an investment in the future and a fundamental aspect of all human resource development programs. But the reality of the population growth is still evident. These expected population figures confirm that we should further and faster reduce fertility.