By Chioma Blessing Kanu
A group of Civil Society Organisations under the aegis of
Partnership for Advocacy in Child and family health (PACFaH) in Nigeria has
warned that delay in vaccination will result in death of over 50,000 by 2020.
The group which comprises Association for the Advancement of
Family Planning (AAFP), Centre for Health Research Initiative in Nigeria (CHR),
Civil Society for Scaling up Nutrition in Nigeria (CS-SUNN), Civil Society
Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC), development Research and Projects Centre
(dRPC), Federation of Muslim Women
Organizations of Nigeria (FOMWAN), Health Reform Foundation of Nigeria
(HERFON), and Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria (PSN) has called on governments
at all levels to identify innovative mechanisms to provide adequate funding for
effective child and family health in Nigeria.
From L-R: Dr. Adeleke, Dr. Shuaib, Habibah Basanya,
Presenter, TVC, and Dr. Momah, during the interactive session on TVC, Lagos.
Speaking recently in an interactive session on TVC in Lagos,
the group urged the government to ensure adequate funding to four important
areas in child and family health such as Routine Immunization, Family Planning,
Amoxicillin as first line treatment for Pneumonia and ORS-Zinc as treatment for
childhood diarrheal diseases, and Nutrition.
Responding to questions from journalists, Civil Society for
Scaling up Nutrition in Nigeria (CS-SUNN) represented by Dr. Philipa Momah
noted as one of the critical factor hampering child health in Nigeria,
malnutrition, which occurs when people consistently do not consume or absorb
the right amounts and types of food and essential nutrients.
She said, “Globally, it contributes to nearly half of all
child deaths-that is more than 3 million children each year. The main indicator
for malnutrition is stunting- when children are too short for their age.
Stunted children have poor physical growth and brain development, preventing
them from thriving and living up to their full potential. With over 11 million
stunted children, Nigeria is confronted with daunting challenge of malnutrition
and ranks second behind India among all countries with the highest number of
stunted children.
“Nationally, the 2013 Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey
(NDHS) reported of 37% stunted, 29% underweight, and 18% wasted children under
five (wasting increased from 14% in 2008 to 18%) 17% Exclusive breastfeeding rate and only 10%
compliance to recommended infant and young child feeding practices. At the
states Kaduna is 56.6%, Nasarawa; 34.5%
and Niger; 34.2% respectively.
“Nigerian government through the Federal Ministry of Health
has identified nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive interventions in the
five-year costed Health sector National Strategic Plan of Action on Nutrition
(NSPAN) 2014 -2019. The plan was adopted at the 57th National council on health
(NCH) meeting HELD IN October 2014, by representatives from the 36 states. The
document if implemented, will by 2019 reduce stunting by 20%, low birth weight
by 15%, anemia among women of reproductive age by 50%, reduce and maintain
childhood wasting by 15% and increase exclusive breast feeding in the first six
months by 50%.”
Momah called for: prompt implementation of the National
Strategic Plan of Action on Nutrition at every level, with emphasis on maternal
and child nutrition; focused and strategic media coverage of nutrition
interventions; maximum support for policy implementation by private sector
through the development of low cost, nutritious complementary foods and
fortification of staple foods; enhanced advocacy by civil society for the
implementation of maternal and child nutrition interventions; and sustained
community health education on nutrition.
The Executive Director of Community Health and Research
Initiative (CHRI), Dr. Muhammad Inuwa Shuaib, added that Nigeria has recorded
significant progress in reducing childhood mortality, and vaccines have been a
significant contributor.
“New vaccines such as the Pentavalent vaccine have been
introduced and Routine Immunization (RI) coverage has improved significantly
from about 48% to 50 % in 2012 and 2013, to coverage of 87% nationwide in 2014.
Also, Nigeria is moving towards Polio Interruption and Eradication as,
throughout 2014, only 6 cases were reported. Government of Nigeria (GoN) plans
to introduce 5 new life-saving vaccines between 2014 -2018, including malaria
(when licensed) and the updated Routine Immunization program can save 1.2
million lives between 2015 and 2020, compared with the current program.”
He however, warned that delay in introduction of the new
vaccines by one year will result in no fewer than 5,000 deaths over 2015-2020;
delaying by two years would result in 50,000 more deaths over 2015-2020; and
choosing not to introduce or sustain key vaccines will result in fewer lives
saved.
Shuaibu advised Nigerian government to: increase domestic
budget for RI and timely release of funds for vaccines procurement and
logistics, to ensure additional vaccines introduced are adequately provided to
save more lives of Nigerian children; promote access to needed health care by
ensuring 90% coverage for immunizations and deliveries by skilled birth
attendants; establish Vaccine Intervention Fund (VIF) to draw contributions
from public and private sources; institute transparency and accountability in
routine immunization fund by appointing credible Nigerians with a proven track
record to manage the fund.
Health Reform Foundation of Nigeria (HERFON) represented by
Dr. Seun Adeleke, highlighted that a survey conducted by the Foundation across
Nasarawa, Kaduna and Oyo to track allocation and releases for the 2014 family
planning budget revealed some implementation such as lack of a detailed
quantification and costing of family planning need over a period time;
executive-legislative bottlenecks to adequate allocation to family planning;
delay in the release of funds by the ministry of finance and Accountant
General’s office; over-reliance on international
donors for family planning financing.
“HERFON intends to redress these gaps by addressing the
government’s reluctance to fulfill existing commitments on Family
Planning-related policies, budgets, and guidelines implementation; and
advocating for social accountability on the demand side, mainly by building
capacity of CSOs on family planning advocacy,” he said.
Also speaking at the session, Mrs. Chinwe Onumonu,
representing Association for the Advancement of Family Planning (AAFP)
reiterated that a woman’s ability to space and limit her pregnancies has a
direct impact on her health and well-being as well as on the outcome of each
pregnancy.
She said: “Family Planning has been universally recognized as
one of the key pillars and most cost effective means of achieving safe
motherhood. Due to its direct positive impacts on the health of the family and
consequently the economy of a nation as a whole, meeting the unmet need for
family planning can help Nigeria significantly reduce the cost of meeting the
MDGs goals 4 & 5 of reduction of maternal mortality and child
mortality. Demographic dividend which is
the accelerated economic growth that may result from a decline in the country’s
mortality and fertility and the subsequent change in the age structure of the
population can be achieved through an effective family planning program.”
Discussing the current situation of family planning in
Nigeria, Onumonu explained that Nigeria currently occupies the top position of
the most populous country in Africa with a population of over 175million people
and ranks as the tenth most populous in the world; and women constitute a large
proportion of this population.
“2006 census estimates about 68 million females in Nigeria.
Out of this, 30 million are of reproductive age (15-49 years). About 6 million
of this population becomes pregnant each year with about 5 million resulting to
child births. 576 women out of every 100,000 live births, die as a result of
these pregnancies and childbirths. This figure translates to 111 women and
young girls dying daily or 5 women every hour. Up to 30% of these are deaths
can be prevented by increasing access to and uptake of contraceptives,” she
explained.
Onumonu called for intensified advocacy for adequate funding
for the implementation of family planning programmes; increased media publicity
to encourage corporate social responsibility initiatives directed at funding
for family planning programmes and services at national, state and grassroot;
increased attention for family planning in public discourse through sustained analyses
of the strategic contents of the Nigeria Family Planning Blueprint, 2014-2018.
Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria (PSN) represented by Mr.
Abubakar Amidu said advocacy by the Society would focus on two different areas
including childhood pneumonia and diarrhea, which are leading killers of over
200,000 children under the age of 5 years in Nigeria annually; and the need to
hold government accountable for the implementation of its commitment to provide
the essential medicines, especially Amoxicillin Dispersible Tablets and
Zinc/ORS recommended by United Nations Committee on Life Saving Commodities
(UNCoLSC).
More importantly, the Federation of Muslim Women Associations
of Nigerian (FOMWAN) represented by Mallam Abdul Ibrahim Audu promised that as
a leading faith based organization, FOMWAN will mobilize constituencies of
traditional and religious leaders and their organizations to support the
activities of PACFaH members.
“FOMWAN will also adopt a pro-active role by initiating
activities to create an enabling environment to support the work of PACFaH.
This will be done by FOMWAN taking up an important task of supporting faith
based advocates in PACFaH's 6 focal states plus FCT to independently conduct
advocacy visits and convene radio programs on the importance of funding child
and family health. In summary, FOMWAN is providing the community window to the
PACFaH project.
“In summary, we want to see increase in funding for child and
family health programs by governments in the focal states and nationally. We
want to see fulfillment of commitments by the government of Nigeria to her
signatures on child and family health related documents and global targets. We
want to see more accountability on the part of the government through
responsiveness to the child and family health needs of her citizen. We want to see more community involvement and
ownership of child and family health initiatives and programs in focal states
and the national level”, he stressed.
