Group decries low patronage of free health, maternal facilities

By Oluwaseun Akingboye, Akure

 

EVIDENCE for Action (E4A), a non-governmental organisation in Ondo State has decried the poor response of the people in Owo, Odigbo, Akure North and Akoko South East Local Councils to the new born and maternal healthcare initiatives in the state.

To further square up the inadequacies in the four councils, E4A has partnered with the Abiye and Agbebiye initiatives, through its Mamaye Advocacy, to attain maximal result and ensure pregnancy is no longer a death sentence.

Though the state Commissioner for Health, Dr. Dayo Adeyanju, expressed the readiness of the state through its primary healthcare programmes to sensitise the people and improve on the poor turnout in the affected areas, E4A stated the need for active participation by all stakeholders.

Adeyanju told The Guardian in Akure during the 10th Maternal, Newborn and Child Health Week (MNCHW), that the next assessment would exceed the 6,000 referrals and safe deliveries recorded earlier in the sector.

For the record, a research carried by E4A revealed the poor performance in local councils across the three senatorial districts of the state, especially in the north, which had only 30 deliveries in Owo Local Council out of the 6,000 deliveries.

This was made known by the National Advisor of E4A, Fola Adewusi, during the Mamaye Community Launch organised for pregnant women, Agbebiye Vanguards and healthcare workers in Owo town. The Mamaye community launch is an awareness programme, “more of getting people to know that the government is interested in reducing maternal and child mortality rate in the state and Nigeria as a whole.”

The Director, Planning, Research and Statistics of Ondo State Primary Health Care Development Agency, Dr. Yetunde Olagbuji lamented that in the affected four local councils, only 16 percent of those who registered for antenatal went back for delivery.

She enjoined pregnant women in the area to desist from patronising the local birth attendants but utilise the facilities, which the state government has provided for their healthcare.