By Iliya Kure
Kaduna (Nigeria) — Child spacing stakeholders from northern Nigeria will meet on Tuesday and Wednesday in Kaduna to discuss strategies of reducing maternal death burdens in the region.
Organised by Kaduna State government, with support from UNFPA, the conference is expected to draw about two hundred participants comprising of policy makers, health workers, the media, development partner and Civil Society Organizations among others from Northern states of the country.
“The main aim of the meeting is to build a consensus on a regional strategy for improvement of access and utilization of reproductive health services and information in Northwest Nigeria by 2018,” says a statement by UNFPA in Kaduna
Northeast Nigeria bears the highest burden of maternal deaths in the country – according to NDHS 2013, the burden is as high as 1,540 deaths per 100,000 live births. This is followed by the northwest with 1,024 deaths per 100,000 live births.
https://www.africaprimenews.com/2017/06/06/health/totally-free-child-spacing-services-for-kaduna-women-begins-in-july-dr-balarabe/
Child spacing experts say the practice can reduce these death burden on countries. The idea is to have women rest well between pregnancies.
“Today millions of women still lack access to child spacing services, yet it is known that about 30% of these deaths can be averted by improving access to contraceptives and increasing uptake of child spacing services. Fast-tracking progress to increase access to child spacing information and services is necessary to meet the national goal of reaching 36 % Contraceptive prevalence rate (CPR) by 2018.
“The proposed Family Planning conference is a key moment to reflect on lessons learned, challenges slowing down progress, and to re-orient strategies focusing on equity, addressing the most vulnerable and hard-to- reach populations,” the UNFPA statement says.
In 2012, Nigeria made a commitment at the London Family Planning Summit to increase investment in child spacing for more women to access service. The plan was to have 36% of women of reproductive age in the country to start spacing their birth by 2018. In 2013, only 15% of them were spacing their births (NDHS).
Recent survey (PMA2020) shows that Nigeria is far from attaining the target. This is because the country has failed to allocate adequate resources to make services available to women who genuinely need them – a lot of these abound, especially at the rural communities.
The poor performance has led the country to review its commitment. The current national target is 27% of women of reproductive age in the country to space their births by year 2020.
The country has recently launched new National Family Planning Communication Campaign on use of contraceptives, as well as a new logo called “Green Dot”, to ensure that 7.3 million women have access to family planning.
Director, Family Health Planning, Federal Ministry of Health, Dr. Abebimpe Adebiyi, told journalists that the campaign, would close the contraceptive gap.
“Years after the first National Family Planning Campaign was launched, Nigeria has remained stagnated.”
“The significant gaps still persist between knowledge and contraceptive use thereby creating marginal shifts in unmet needs for family planning in the country,” she said.
Find Below the UNFPA Press Release
Regional Consultative Conference on Child Spacing Programmes and Services: Scaling Up Strategies to Achieve SDG 3 and 5 in Northern Nigeria
Kaduna: The Kaduna State Ministry of Health and Human Services, through Kaduna State Primary Health
Care Development Agency (SPHCDA) in collaboration with the Child Spacing Technical Working Group and financial support from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) is organizing a two-day regional
consultative meeting on Child Spacing strategies for the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) on maternal health in Northern Nigeria from the 28 -29 November 2017 in Kaduna.
The conference will bring together two hundred participants comprising of a wide range of stakeholders including policy makers, health workers, health educators, the media and Civil Society Organizations from the Local Government Areas of Northern Nigeria.
The main aim of the meeting is to build a consensus on a regional strategy for improvement of access and utilization of reproductive health services and information in Northwest Nigeria by 2018.
According to the 2013 National Demographic and Health Survey (NDHS), Nigeria is only 2% of the world’s population yet it accounts for over 10% of maternal deaths globally. Each day, 110 women succumb to pregnancy-related deaths with more women dying in Northern Nigeria.
Specifically, the North West and North East regions have the worst indices where the maternal mortality is twice the national average with over 1,500 deaths per 100,000 live births.
Today millions of women still lack access to child spacing services, yet it is known that about 30% of these deaths can be averted by improving access to contraceptives and increasing uptake of child spacing services. Fast-tracking progress to increase access to child spacing information and services is necessary to meet the national goal of reaching 36 % Contraceptive prevalence rate (CPR) by 2018.
The proposed Family Planning conference is a key moment to reflect on lessons learned, challenges slowing down progress, and to re-orient strategies focusing on equity, addressing the most vulnerable and hard-to- reach populations.
UNFPA is fully committed to partnership with all States and with development partners, to leverage on our comparative strengths for more results and sustainable, impactful State-owned child spacing programmes.
As the late Executive Director of UNFPA, Prof. Babatunde Osotimehin, said with a call to action: “Until every girl, every woman, everybody wherever they may be, can access reproductive health services, especially family planning, the work is not done”. UNFPA remains committed to ensuring that every child birth is by choice, not by chance.
For further enquiry, please contact: Ms Mariama Darboe: 08051101852, darboe@unfpa.org; Dr. Audu Alayande: 08035368020, alayande@unfpa.org.
