Maternity leave extended for 10 days in Bahrain

Parliamentarians yesterday approved a proposal ratcheting up the length of maternity leave of government employees by ten more days to 70.

Earlier, woman employees in government jobs had only 60 days to take care of her baby, before returning to work. The new rule also gives a father a three-day leave to help the mother and baby. Earlier, he had only a single day for that.

Deputy Fatima Al Bukhari said that, the cost of the implementing proposal does not exceed 500 thousand dinars, which she said is very small compared to the benefits reaped. The cost is minor compared to the total manpower related expenditures, which is more than one million dinars, according to the financial statement of the year 2019, she added. Al Qadri said the extra days would have tremendous impact on women's health and psyche.

''It allows her sometime to overcome the effects of postpartum'', Qatri added that many men are now deducing days from their annual leave to assist mother and baby during the first days of birth.