Joe Osuji, commissioner for Health, Abia State, has stressed the need to entrench the practice of family planning in Nigeria, describing it as effective means of preventing maternal mortality and ensuring quality healthcare in families.
Osuji made the call in Umuahia during a family planning workshop organised by Marie Stopes Nigeria, which is aimed at promoting the use of DMPA-SC self-injection method of family planning.
The workshop themed ‘Abia State DMPA (Sayana Press) dissemination meeting,’ had in attendance, relevant agencies in health sector in Abia State and from the 17 local government areas of the state.
The health Commissioner, who described Marie Stopes Nigeria as a key partner to Abia State government in promotion of quality health policies, drummed support for the DMPC-SC self-injecting family planning method among women but advised married women against hiding the scheme and its methods from their husbands.
Chinagozi Adindu, the executive secretary of Abia State Primary Healthcare Development Agency, representatives of society for family health and World Health Organisation (WHO) in their different speeches during the event urged Abia women to key into the Sayana Press injection initiative as it has been recording commendable success among the users in various parts of the country where it had been introduced.
Earlier in her keynote presentation, the clinical training officer of Marie Stopes in Abia State, Faith Anikwe listed the benefits of the use of self-injection formula of family planning.
According to her, the campaigns against maternal mortality had received a great boost from Marie Stopes Nigeria in most parts of Nigeria in the last few years of the group’s health activities in Nigeria, adding that 600 trainers had been trained across the nation to train others in the use of the family planning method.
Anikwe pointed out that 50 persons, comprising nurses and midwives who had been trained in Abia State by Marie Stopes Nigeria had equally trained many women in urban and rural areas on the benefits of DMPA-SC Sayana self-injection, noting that the trainees have started applying it without side effects.
Read also: Family planning will reduce maternal, infant deaths in Nigeria by 30% – Experts
She traced the background of the programme to 2017 meeting held at Federal Ministry of Health Abuja, adding that the good results have been recorded among trainers and users while many state governments have also keyed into the formula.
She disclosed that the organisation which “is into all level of medi care, came into Abia State in the middle of 2020.”
Speaking earlier, the South East regional coordinator of Marie Stopes Nigeria, Samuel Ibekwe urged husbands in Abia State to encourage their wives to embrace family planning as doing so would assist them in raising the number of children they can take care of.
Ibekwe noted that many young men had died at untimely ages because of socio-economic hardship they encountered in marriage occasioned by birth of many children.
He explained that his organisation does not encourage service providers and users to hide the process and benefits from their spouses, stating that in the case of any side effects on the user, phone numbers are provided for them for directions as all World Health Organisation’s standards are followed.
The regional coordinator further said that any woman of reproductive age could access the family planning method of his organisation.
During the workshop, some master trainers of the organisation like Leticia Agwara from Isukwuato and Adanma Kelechi Iheme said they trained some people who are also training more people on the use of the Sayana-type of family planning.
Iheme, who told the participants that Abia State has received certificate of participation from the federal ministry of health, promised to help in deepening the knowledge and understanding of its benefits in their lives and families.
“Before we give this injection to our clients, we ensure that we carry out medical eligibility on the clients,” Iheme said.
Also, trainers from Osisioma, Obingwa, Ukwa East, Isiala Ngwa North and the representative of Society for Family Health, Eze Chiemela, took turns to emphasise many people they trained so far had indicated their readiness to self-inject.
Obasi Uche, another satisfied user, confirmed that there had been no side effects on her since she started using the self-injection formula introduced by Marie Stopes Nigeria.
