Comments on the visit to the Women’s Hospital by Alex Ardito

The most significant thing that I learned a lot about today was the second location we visited. The Women’s Hospital was really incredible because it had many sectors and programs in place to increase the quality of life of both the Costa Rican mothers and their newborns. Firstly, similar to Japan, Costa Rican health providers encourage their patients who are new mothers to stay together with their newborns. This includes the mother sleeping with the baby to make sure the baby is secure overnight. Secondly, the hospital has established a milk bank to ensure that the newborns receive proper nourishment. Thirdly, the hospital has a breastfeeding clinic. These clinics prove to be the most important because they are educational programs for new mothers specifically set up so that they can feed their newborns safely and effectively. These factors together heavily attribute to Costa Rica’s low infant mortality rate and mother mortality rate. Furthermore, birth control is provided for free keeping the Costa Rican teen pregnancy rate low as well; however, because of a strong sense of religion abortion is not administered.