Fernando, Sylvia (1904–1983)

Sri Lankan teacher and family planning advocate who was one of the founders in 1953 of the Family Planning Association of Ceylon. Born in 1904 in Colombo, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka); died in Colombo, Sri Lanka, in 1983; her father was a gynecologist and obstetrician and her mother was active in social work; had one brother; married; children: daughter, Nimali.

Sri Lanka, a lush tropical island nation situated off the southeastern tip of India, is a case study of rapid population growth. In its first census, taken in 1871 while it was the British Crown Colony of Ceylon, the population count was about 2.5 million. A century later the population had reached 13 million, and by the early 1990s it stood at over 17 million, making the nation of Sri Lanka one of the most densely populated non-industrialized nations in the world. A civil war that began in 1983 served to further impoverish and demoralize this land of stunning natural beauty.

After becoming an independent nation in 1948, few of its citizens looked upon family planning as a major priority of the new state. Virtually none of the men and only a small number of women had even heard of birth control. One woman, however, who appeared on the scene even before independence was achieved in 1948 was to prove herself a key player in a social and intellectual transformation that would bring about significant change. Sylvia Fernando was born in 1904 into an elite family in the capital city of Colombo; her father was a gynecologist and obstetrician and her mother was active in social work.

While growing up, young Sylvia would hear countless stories from her parents about the women whose families were sinking deeper and deeper into poverty because they were always pregnant, ill and exhausted. These were truly firsthand experiences, given the fact that her father was the medical superintendent at the De Sousa Maternity Hospital, while Sylvia's mother did social work at the Dean's Road Clinic. Sylvia Fernando was determined that when she grew up she would do something about this situation.

The obstacles to establishing an effective system of family planning in Ceylon/Sri Lanka were many and formidable. The new nation was composed of a great variety of ethnic groups and religions, with little trust between communities and much ingrained social conservatism deeply embedded in their thinking and life patterns. In the 1930s and 1940s, Fernando gained valuable experience as a leading member of the All Ceylon Women's Conference, an umbrella organization representing all of the colony's major women's and service organizations. During countless meetings and individual encounters with women representing the different ethnic and religious communities of Ceylon, she became sensitive to the hopes and fears of not only elite women but the masses who lived in tradition-bound villages and rural areas. Working alongside her mother at the Dean's Road Clinic, Fernando saw women who had become physically and emotionally drained by constant childbearing, and as time went by she began to seek solutions to this problem.

It was on a trip to the United Kingdom in 1946 that Fernando was able to obtain funding for a pilot program for family planning in Ceylon. She was particularly encouraged in her work on this occasion by meeting with the Norwegian champion of birth control, Elise Ottesen-Jensen (1886–1973). Back in Colombo, a small group of women—at first, probably no more than 14 or 15—were organized by Fernando to build the foundations of a birth-control program. The obstacles facing the successful implementation of a national agenda of family planning were immense, particularly from conservative religious leaders, be they Roman Catholic, Buddhist, Hindu or Muslim. As a Christian, Fernando strongly believed that abortion should not be part of a family-planning scheme, not only because she was personally opposed to abortions but also because offering them to women would very likely engender even greater resistance to the idea of contraception and family planning. With these ideas as the basis of her projected campaign, in September 1953, at the De Sousa Hospital for Women, Fernando opened the first family planning clinic.

She received strong support in her work not only from her husband, who was "very enthusiastic" about her efforts, but from her entire family, including her mother, brother, and daughter Nimali . Her family's supportive attitude was psychologically essential during then early 1950s when her Family Planning Association (FPA) was still in its infancy and much of the population regarded Fernando and her associates as "vulgar and shameless people" who dared to meddle in the most intimate aspects of the lives of men and women. Fernando would serve as head of the FPA for the next 17 years. Phyllis Dissanayake , who would succeed Fernando in 1970, recalled how even after more than a decade of work some of the organization's officers still had dirt thrown at them in some communities because they had dared to discuss "dirty things" and interfered in a domain where not free human choice but "God gave children."

In the early years of the FPA, the political fallout from a family-planning program was such that the organization's first government grant had to remain a secret. By the early 1960s, however, the intense educational efforts of Sylvia Fernando and her national team had significantly changed attitudes so that in 1965 the Sri Lankan government officially recognized family planning as a national goal, taking over the clinics that had up to that time been run on a private basis. By this time, 85 clinics were in operation throughout Sri Lanka. Sylvia Fernando died suddenly in Colombo in 1983, passing away in the arms of Dr. Siva Chinnatamby , her trusted FPA medical expert and a woman who had been instrumental in introducing the newest contraceptive methods to Sri Lanka.

sources:

Huston, Perdita. Motherhood by Choice: Pioneers in Women's Health and Family Planning. NY: The Feminist Press, 1992.

Linder, Doris H. Crusader for Sex Education: Elise Ottesen-Jensen (1886–1973) in Scandinavia and on the International Scene. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1996.

"Sylvia Fernando 1904–1983," in People [London]. Vol. 19, no. 1, 1992, p. 24.

John Haag , Assistant Professor of History, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia