3. Results3.1. Characteristics of the SamplesThe sample for this study was based on the last birth of currently married women aged 15�C49 years who had given birth 5 years preceding the survey. Table 1 summarizes the total sample for each country and the percentage selleck catalog distribution by the independent variables.Table 1Percentage distribution of the study population by country.The level of urbanization in all the six countries was considerably lower than the average for the less developed world which stood at 46 percent in 2010. A significant proportion of women and their husbands in these countries had never been to school. Gender gap in education was most pronounced in Pakistan, where two-thirds of the women had never been to school. Women in the three Sub-Saharan African countries, especially in Tanzania, had very high labor force participation rate.

In contrast, few women in South Asia were reported as working. In the five countries where data are available, women in Kenya had relatively high status in the family as compared to the rest. In contrast, Tanzanian women had the lowest status within the family. Women in all the six countries in this study had low media exposure.For the wealth quintile, the deviation from 20 percent for the various subgroups can be explained by the uneven distribution of childbearing women in the 5 years preceding the survey. In Kenya, Nigeria, and Pakistan, women giving births in the five years before the survey were over-represented by those in the poorest wealth quintile, but they were over-represented by those in the richest quintile in Bangladesh and India.

The modal age group was below 30 years for all the six countries, with Bangladesh and India having the youngest age structure. Except for Bangladesh and India, the number of women having 1-2, 3-4, and 5 or more children was rather evenly split.3.2. Place of Delivery and Birth AttendanceIn all the six countries, more than half of the births occurred outside a health facility, and most of these were home delivery. Figure 1 shows that noninstitutional delivery was highest in Bangladesh, followed by Nigeria and Pakistan. Of those who delivered in a health facility, women from the three Sub-Saharan African countries were much more likely to deliver in a public health facility rather than a private health facility.

In Bangladesh and India, about the same proportion of women used the public and private Batimastat health facilities but Pakistani women were twice as likely to use a private health facility rather than a public health facility for childbirth. Figure 1Percentage distribution of the place of delivery by country.Use of trained attendant for delivery corresponded closely with the place of delivery. All the births that occurred in a hospital or clinic were delivered by a trained attendant.