MISP
Minimum Initial Service Package

Minimum Initial Service Package (MISP) for Reproductive Health in Crisis Situations is a one-year project that aims to make SRHR information and services available or accessible to Internally Displaced Persons or Populations (IDPs), such as those displaced by the ongoing armed conflict between the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in the province of Maguindanao.

For the past 11 months, Muslims in Maguindanao have been subjected to intermittent clashes between government troops and the separatist MILF. Their lives have been imperiled as they find themselves helpless in the middle of violent encounters between the two warring groups. The conflict has been ongoing for more than three decades now. Renewed fighting erupted in the middle of 2008 after peace negations failed again and caused the displacement of numerous families and their communities. This resulted in an outpouring of humanitarian response that addresses every aspect of basic survival such as food, shelter, water and sanitation. About 75 percent of those who were displaced are women, while 4 percent of them are pregnant. The rest are infants, children and young people. These groups have special reproductive health needs that cannot be addressed unless reproductive health services are integrated in disaster response programs.

The MISP is a set of activities that saves lives and prevents trauma, disability and death to women, especially those pregnant and victims of sexual abuse. Another target of the project is children. Not considering the MISP in emergency settings results to serious consequences. If, however, applied, it can prevent maternal and newborn deaths, sexual violence and subsequent trauma, sexually transmitted infections, unplanned and complicated pregnancies, and the possible spread of HIV.

The goal of the project is to mainstream the MISP in disaster response. The project is being piloted in the province of Maguindanao for one year. It will be expanded to other areas in Mindanao where prolonged fighting have caused massive displacement of populations.

Specifically, the project aims to decrease the incidence of maternal mortality/morbidity (projected at 7119 cases), newborn mortality (projected at 284 incidences based on 4 percent crude birth rate) and rape of women and children (45 cases), and provide contraception to women of reproductive age in five preselected evacuation camps in Maguindanao.

FPOP is implementing this project in partnership with UNFPA, Red Cross, DOH-ARMM, DSWD and other humanitarian organizations operating in the project site. Support is being provided by the SPRINT initiative funded by AUSAID.

Activities:

• Deployment of two (2) physicians and six (6) nurses/midwives in the project site, which is now being done in collaboration with DOH-ARMM/IPHO Maguindanao. They will provide reproductive health services to the IDPS in the evacuation camps and nearby health facilities.
• Provision of family planning supplies, medical equipment and generators/solar panels to Rural Health Units (RHUs) so they can operate 24 hours a day during emergency situations.
• Provision and ensuring availability of two vehicles that will respond to emergency cases such as pregnant women in the evacuation camps experiencing obstetric complications who need to be transported to a hospital for emergency management.

Coordination with other agencies to facilitate treatment for and care of victims of sexual violence