Husbands have been urged to support their wives in the use of family planning and to do away with the notion that family planning promotes promiscuity among women.
Director of Family Health and Nutrition, Lagos State Ministry of Health, Dr. Folashade Oludara, who made the appeal, said husbands who prevented their wives from accessing family planning services for the fear of infidelity, should desist from such attitude, stressing that family planning was a tool for safe motherhood and not for promiscuity.
Oludare explained, “Family planning is one of the major components and pillars of safe-motherhood. It is a method that assists individuals in deciding the number of children to have and when to have them. This will ultimately improve the economy of individuals, families and the nation as a whole.”
Oludare, who spoke with our correspondent, maintained that family planning and child spacing were some of the most effective ways of reducing maternal deaths arising from preventable causes.
Speaking on the topic titled, “Family Planning, Child Spacing: Empowering People, Building Nations,” she said, “Family planning brings life to mother as a person; it also creates healthy environment for the nation, and it allows our women to reach old age and attain their full potential because so many women’s destinies are being cut short because of unwanted pregnancy and unsafe abortion.”
Lamenting the low patronage of modern contraceptives in Nigeria despite their numerous benefits, Oludare, however, said the 2013 National Demographic Survey reported contraceptive prevalence rate of 48 per cent for all methods in Lagos State.
Findings showed that the country’s Contraceptive Prevalence Rate was as low as 15.1 per cent, which is far from the 36 per cent target by 2020.
According to a new study, published by the Guttmacher Institute, contraceptive services and maternal and newborn health services fall far short of needs in developing regions like Nigeria.
To improve uptake of family planning in the state, Oludara said the Ministry of Health had been making giants strides to ensure that a wide range of modern FP methods were available and accessible to the target populace.
“This includes provision of free FP commodities and services at all public health facilities and private facilities with trained providers, establishment of efficient system of supply and distribution of FP commodities to all providers,” she said.
She revealed that the uptake of family planning by 600,000 women in less than six months, helped the state in averting 46,000 unsafe abortions, 143,000 unintended pregnancies and 800 maternal deaths.
