…implements 3 yr project worth 2m dollars
By Hassan Zaggi
In order to totally eradicate maternal and child deaths in Nigeria, Rotary International (RI) has called on President Muhammadu Buhari, to, as a matter of urgency, assent the bill on ‘Compliance with the reporting and the review of maternal deaths’ that is currently on his table.
The bill has since been passed by the Senate and forwarded to the office of the President which is awaiting the President’s assent.
Speaking at a media briefing in Abuja, the National Coordinator, Rotary Maternal and Child Health (RMCH) Project in Nigeria, Prof Emmanuel Lufadeju, disclosed that the RI has concluded plans to implement a two million-dollar project aimed at reducing maternal and child deaths in the country by 25 per cent in the next three years.
This, according to him, was approved by the Rotary Foundation.
The project which is christened: ‘Together for Healthy Families in Nigeria’ aims to improve access to life-saving quality healthcare and tailored family planning services.
“We introduced a bill in the Nigeria Senate together with the Federal Ministry of Health on ‘Compliance with the reporting and the review of maternal deaths resulting from complications’ and the bill has been endorsed by the Nigeria Senate and it is lying on the table of the president for assent.
“As soon as the bill is signed, of course, maternal deaths surveillance, response in Nigeria will become a law. One of our responsibility will be to advocate compliance with this law in all the 36 states of the country and the FCT,” Prof. Lufadeju.
On the 2 million dollar three-year project aimed at reducing maternal deaths, the RMCH Coordinator explained that: “As you know, two years ago, we work nationally in the 36 states and FCT, we have learnt some lessons, we have also learnt some challenges, we have seen gaps that need to be filled.
“So the programme which was submitted to the Rotary Foundation has been approved for our district. Out of many districts in the world, that applied, we came number one. And this approval indicates that all the lessons we have learnt from the previous three years of project, has been concretised in a small location.
“The locations include Ekiti, Nasarawa, Gombe states and FCT. In all of these states, we have selected two local governments and in each local government we are working in seven facilities.
“Six primary health care centres and one secondary facility for reference, totaling 49 healthcare facilities in the country.
“The idea is to be able to deepen the knowledge that we have gained in the last three years to be able to come out with a model that is replicable.
“We are still going to go nationally, but before then, we want to make sure that we deepen all the knowledge that has been established and we can now improve the process in this small area so that once the processes are improved and we design methodology for expansion, then the programme will be ready for replication nationally. We have a very task to accomplish this between 2023 and 2025.”
