The Ogun State House of Assembly Committee on Health has assured to put in place better policy environment for family planning/child birth spacing service delivery and adolescent reproductive healthcare to further reduce maternal mortality and morbidity deaths as well as
child marriage, unwanted pregnancy, abortion and other young persons molestation in the society.
Adegoke Adeyanju, chairman of the committee stated this while playing host to a Non- governmental advocacy working group, Family Health Initiative Ogun (FAHIO), at the Assembly’s complex, Oke-Mosan, Abeokuta.
Adeyanju said family healthcare remains a core aspect that needed to be strengthened for the general wellbeing of the society, noting that the Public Private Partnership (PPP) initiative of Governor Dapo Abiodun-led administration is an all encompassing avenue to facilitate
the required framework for the provision of effective family planning services and adolescent reproductive healthcare programmes.
He pointed out that the Committee would linked up with relevant government agencies to know the situations surrounding its budgeting, fund release, service delivery, availability of commodities and consumables in order to enhance the service delivery.
‘’This aspect of healthcare is germane due to the fact that the wellbeing of mothers, children and adolescents have multiple effects on the family and the society at large. The administration of Prince Dapo Abiodun has taken healthcare serious which made him to declare state of emergency in the sector. I want to assure this group that your concern for improvement in the provision of family planning/ childbirth spacing services and adolescent reproductive health will be looked into’’, Adeyanju said.
In their separate contributions, other members of the Committee, Atinuke Bello, Latifat Ajayi and Wahab Haruna, unanimously affirmed that any method of contraception is necessary for women of childbearing age to adopt for them to be physically and mentally fit
in order to cope with home affairs, adding that the Committee would intensify efforts to co-opt other Honourable members in the House to promote family planning and adolescent reproductive health progammme in their respective constituencies.
Earlier in her presentation, Oluwakemi Balogun chairperson of FAHIO, said the group believed in advocacy to strengthen the health system of Ogun state for the sustenance of its landmark indices records, adding that provision of adequate consumables to public health facilities would allow for free access of family planning services and afford the State to meet up the projected 52 percent Contraceptive Prevalence Rate (CPR) by year 2020.
Also, Olajide Odugbemi, secretary of the group, stated that the contributions of the lawmakers to the development of the health sector in their various constituencies would help in the revitalisation of primary healthcare for the grassroots to enjoy adequate services.
He added that investment in family planning and reproductive health is one of the realistic funding decision any state or country could make to save healthcare cost on maternal and new born.
Representative of the youths in the group, Dupe Kuku appealed to the lawmakers on the need to address issues inhibiting the access of adolescents in the State to reproductive health services through the sponsoring of inter- generational forum in their represented areas, saying that the development would create platform for adolescent, parents, opinion leaders and other relevant stakeholders to discuss issues that would increase adolescent knowledge on how best handle their reproductive health against child marriage, unwanted pregnancy, rape, contracting HIV and STI infections among others.
RAZAQ AYINLA, Ogun
