As Nigeria joined the rest of the world recently to mark this year’s World Blood Donor Day, Martins Ifijeh writes on the need for Nigerians to imbibe the culture of voluntary blood donation
 
In many parts of the world, pregnancy is considered a beautiful thing.It is every woman’s dream to bring forth a child into the world. In fact, the pride of a baby bump is flaunted at every opportunity, even on social media because women in such climes are almost certain they will give birth safely. After all, pregnancy is not a disease, but a blessing.

Nigeria’s population continues to increase rapidly with no commensurate development in health care service delivery. With a current estimated population of 186 million and an annual growth rate of about 2.5%, Nigeria’s huge population, fuelled by high birth rate without good family planning, can be a huge burden with resultant poor health indices such as high maternal and infant deaths. Nigeria’s maternal and child deaths is one of the highest in the world.

Babatunde Osotimehin, Nigeria’s minister of health from December 2008 to March 2010, is dead.
 
Up until his death, the 68-year-old was the executive director of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).
 
According to sources at the UNFPA, his death was announced at the Nigerian office of the UN body on Monday morning.
 
He was said to have died in New York.
 

In the fight against malnutrition, breast sucking and massage at the pre and post-natal stage of pregnancy is the ‘new kid’ on the block. With continuous engagement, insufficient breast milk formulation for exclusive breast feeding will belong to the past. Kuni Tyessi writes