Invest in Family planning to avert maternal deaths – Media experts tell FG

Invest in Family planning to avert maternal deaths – Media experts tell FG

By: Mohammad Ibrahim, Kaduna.
Media practitioners has urged government at all levels, particularly the Federal Government to invest more funds in providing  family planning commodities to couples as a solution to rise in maternal death in the country.
The practitioners described the increase in women dying during child births as unacceptable while calling on relevant stakeholders to rise to their responsibilities so as to save women lives.
The call was contained in a communiqué signed by Isaiah Benjamin and Stella Kabruk issued at the end of the a media workshop on family planning/child birth spacing organized by the Nigerian Urban Reproductive Health Initiative (NURHI) held in Kaduna.
The media also urged relevant stakeholders in health sector to allay fears on Family planning commodities.
They called on Kaduna State Government to increase its budget allocation for family planning by making the right investment to enable it meet up with the national blueprint of increasing the usage of family planning from 15 percent to 36 percent by 2018.
‪According to them, lack of public sector funding in Kaduna State, both at state and local government levels for family planning commodities and programs is one of the key barriers to access for women in the state.
“A Timely release of allocated funds in the local government areas for family planning budget line, which if promptly release will help the state realize its blueprint goal of  increase contraceptive prevalence from 24.4% to 46.5% by 2018,” they said.
They also called for an immediate take off of the Primary Health Care Under One Roof (PHCUOR) policy by bringing together all the components of the Agency under one management.