Bukola Afeni
The National Coordinator/ Country Director Chair FMOH Safe motherhood Sub Committee Technical Working Group, Prof. Emmanuel Adedolapo Lufadeju, said
improving accessibility, availability, and affordability and quality of care in Primary Health Care Centers (PHCs) will reduce the high rate of neonatal and maternal mortality in Nigeria.
He made the disclosure at a media training/ workshop for Journalists in Abuja.
According to him, Rotary’s intervention in maternal and child projects in Nigeria
has shown that improving the accessibility, availability, affordability and quality of care in Primary Health Care Centers (PHCs) will most likely reduce the high rate of neonatal and maternal mortality in Nigeria.
“We are working primarily in three States and FCT (49 facilities in Seven Local Governments, implementation focus is essentially in Primary Health Care Centres (PHCs 42 and Secondary Facilities 7).”
He said the Rotary Action Group for Reproductive and Maternal Health (RMCH) in collaboration with FMOH, SMOH and with support from The Rotary Foundation is set to create access and community participation for women, men, and adolescents in Nigeria.
“The programme is designed for journalists with a demonstrated interest in health and population issues. Its purpose is to promote accurate, knowledgeable, enterprising and investigative reporting.
“By this training, these journalists through their country wide reports will contribute to the realization of reduced maternal and infant deaths resulting from pregnancy and child birth complications, as well as promote the use of web-based electronic data management in Nigeria”, he said.
Lufadeju said Nigeria is the Awardee of the 2nd ‘’Program of Scale (PoS), a 2 million US dollar grant, for improvement of Maternity and Child Health code named – “Together for Healthy Families in Nigeria”.
The program of Scale “’Together for Healthy Families in Nigeria” involves series of initiatives, practices, protocols and service delivery; structured to give mothers high-quality gynecological examinations, family planning, prenatal, delivery and postpartum care, in order to achieve optimal health for mother, fetus and infant during pregnancy, childbirth and post partum as well as community dialogues to create awareness on reproductive health, outreaches/ home visits to get to more vulnerable beneficiaries.
According to him, the rate of under-five mortality is 132 deaths per 1,000 live births, while the infant mortality rate is 67 deaths per 1,000 live births. Maternal mortality ratio is 512 deaths per 100,000 live births.
In her goodwill message, the Director/Head Family Health Department, Dr. (Mrs) Binyerem Ukaire, FWACS, also commended journalists for reporting accurate, timely and impactful stories fostering a culture of health consciousness.
Ukaire who was represented by Barr. (Mrs) Chinyere. Nma. Ogbonna Head Health Promotion Division Family Health Department FMOH stated the importance of journalism in Health Department.
