Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, has pledged to monitor grant recently disbursed to states in the country for the Save-one-million-lives programme.

A new report launched on Tuesday by the Family Planning 2020, FP2020, has ranked Nigeria among the worst countries in the delivery of family planning services. Nigeria is second to India in a global ranking on the number of women that die as a result of pregnancy.
 
The report used as baseline the target set at the 2012 London Summit on Family Planning where countries made a commitment to mobilise resources to enable 120 million women and girls use modern contraception by 2020 in 69 poorest countries, including Nigeria.
 

The US Consul General, John Bray, says the US will continue to support, encourage and expand its Saving Mothers, Giving Life initiative aimed at reducing maternal and neonatal mortality in Nigeria.

A statement by the information unit of the US Embassy on Monday in Abuja quoted Bray as saying this at the SMGL global team-building meeting in Calabar, Cross River State.

The meeting was organised by the Cross River State Government in partnership with United States Agency for International Development.

A gynaecologist, Dr. Zubairu Usman, on Tuesday urged Nigerian leaders to have the political will to promote child-spacing to curb maternal mortality.

Usman, who works at the Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital, Zaria, Kaduna State made the plea in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria in Zaria, Kaduna State.

He said that maternal mortality rate in the country was quite alarming compared to other developing countries.
Usman said: “Nigeria’s maternal mortality ratio is about 800 per 100,000 life-births.