The Federal Government of Nigeria on Tuesday launched three key reproductive health documents towards scaling up of family planning in Nigeria.
The Minister of Health, Prof. Isaac Adewole, launched the documents in Abuja.
The Minister, who was represented by the Director, Family Health Department, Dr. Adebimpe Adebiyi, said the documents would improve decision making in the health sector, particularly in the area of family planning.
Adewole said: “I am sure that they will contribute to reduction in maternal morbidity and ultimately improve the health of our women and girls.”
The documents include the National Depot Medroxyprogesterone Acetate (DMPA-SC) Accelerated Introduction and Scale-Up Plan 2018-2022.
Adewole said the document was developed to ensure that contraceptive information and services reached women and adolescent girls who might have wanted to avoid pregnancy, space or limit child birth.
It provides the modalities for coordinating the activities of various stakeholders involved in introducing and scaling up Depot Medroxyprogesterone Acetate.
The second document: “National Guidelines on Safe Termination of Pregnancy for Legal Indication,” is to build the capacity of medical professionals to identify pregnancies for which the law is intended to terminate so that ethical and safe management could be instituted.
Adewole said: “It is envisioned to provide information on the subsisting Nigerian law on termination of pregnancy. The document is a compendium of medical conditions and circumstances where the continuation of pregnancy endangers the woman’s life and a step by step option for ethical and safe medical management.”
He said the guideline would preserve the lives of pregnant women who would have died from the continuation of their pregnancies.
On the third document: “Global Family Planning Visibility and Analytical Network/National Logistics Management Information System (NAVISION),” Adewole said it would serve as a platform to capture and use supply chain data from multiple sources and organizations.
The overall objective was to have a platform that would promote more timely and cost-effective delivery of family planning commodities and other health commodities in such a way that more women were reached with the right products where they lived and worked.
Adewole added that NAVISION would aid better coordination and improvement in limited healthcare resources allocation.
Speaking earlier, the WHO Country Director, Dr. Wondi Alemu, represented by Officer in charge of Maternal, Sexual and Reproductive Health, Dr. Olumuyiwa Ojo, said the three documents would ensure universal access to family planning commodity all over the country.
Alemu called on all stakeholders to support the implementation of the “three most important documents” in scaling up of family planning in Nigeria.
