Communities in Zing, Taraba State, have embraced family planning with enthusiasm as a way to check family sizes in tune with current economic realities.
Mrs Roseline John Jella of the General Hospital Zing, who is the local government coordinator of family planning, said that there was a lot of awareness as a result of their outreach program and activities of some NGOs, that has triggered overwhelming interest from the locals.
When Bill Gates some weeks back, told Nigerian political elites that the country is one of the most dangerous places on earth to give birth, not many would have thought of the drama that played out in Akure, the Ondo State capital, the other week.
Pregnant women were reported to have paralyzed activities in the State Specialist Hospital while protesting against outrageous medical fees introduced by the state government.
Determined to curb maternal mortality in the country, Development Communications Network (DEVCOM) in partnership with Nigerian Urban Reproductive Health Initiative (NURHI) yesterday sought partnership of New Telegraph to promote family planning services.
DEVCOM Programme Director, Akin Jimoh, who disclosed this in Lagos, said the country was losing many of women to complications arising from pregnancy and child birth, saying if family planning was effectively deployed by people of reproductive age, it would avert many unintended pregnancies as well as prevent unsafe abortions.
