Q: What services does the Marie Stopes Society provide?

A: Marie Stopes Society provides high quality Reproductive Health information and services. These include counseling, contraception (including emergency contraception), female sterilisation, vasectomy, health screening and referrals.

To meet the mobility challenges faced by many women in Pakistan MSS provides services at three different levels: at the centers, through mobile out reach teams, and community based services delivered at the door steps.

Q: Is Marie Stopes Society a private company?

A: Marie Stopes Society (MSS) is a non-government organization, registered under the Societies Registration Act (1860). Marie Stopes Society operates as a social enterprise rather than on the traditional “Charity” model.

Marie Stopes Society is granted the status of a non-profit organization renewed annually by the office of the Commissioner of Income Tax (Government of Pakistan) under clause (c) of sub section 36 of Section 2 of the Income Tax Ordinance, 2001 read with Rule 214 and 220 of the Income Tax Rules 2002.

Q: Does Marie Stopes Society charge clients fees?

A: Yes, MSS charges subsidized fees. However, fees is further subsidized or not charged at all in cases where clients are unable to pay.

Q: What is Reproductive Health?

A: The international Conference on Population Development (1994) defined Reproductive Health as: a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being in all matters relating to the reproductive system and to its functions and processes. It implies that people have the capability to reproduce and the freedom to decide if, when and how often to do so.

Implicit in this is the right of men and women to be informed and to have access to safe, effective, affordable and acceptable methods of family planning of their choice, as well as other methods of their choice for regulation of fertility, which are not against the law, and the rights of access to health-care services that will enable women to go safely through pregnancy and childbirth.

Reproductive health care also includes sexual health, the purpose of which is the enhancement of life and personal relations.