Iran state hospitals to no longer perform vasectomies, offer contraceptives

Iran has stopped distributing contraceptives at state-run clinics and will no longer perform vasectomies in public hospitals in an effort to boost the country’s birth rate, according to local reports this week.

The procedures and pills will still be available at private medical facilities and pharmacies respectively, and contraceptives will continue to be provided at public hospitals for women whose lives are at risk from pregnancy.

The IRNA news agency on Sunday reported that both births and marriages have been in steep decline over the past decade. Health officials have sounded the alarm over a prospective aging population, prompting the change of policy on state-provided contraceptives.

Iran was once considered an international success story in population control, bringing birth rates down from seven per woman in the 1980s to 2.1 in 2018, according to World Bank figures.

In 2000 then-health minister Alireza Marandi received the United Nations Population Award for his family planning initiatives, which had to overcome entrenched taboos in an Islamic society.

But in recent years there has been concern that Iran overshot its target, with the number of births falling well below the level needed to keep the population growing.

In 2012, supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said it was a mistake to have continued the family planning policies of the 1990s, and called for new measures to double the population to 150 million.