Childcare Centres Recorded 45,000 Deliveries In Two Years

Lagos State Governor Babatunde Fashola on Thursday said the “Maternal and Child Mortality Reduction Programme” of the government in conjuction with the state’s Maternal and Child Care Centres had recorded about 45, 249 deliveries in two years. Fashola spoke in Ikeja during the inauguration of a handbook to ensure safe delivery for mother and child in the state. The governor said, “The objective of our programme is to make sure that mother and child are protected during pregnancy and delivery. Those who give life must not lose theirs in the process of doing so. “Government has therefore initiated various projects into this Maternal and Child Care programmes including the book we are inaugurating today.” Fashola said another landmark project of the programme, which started in 2010, was the construction of eight 100-bed MCCs to address the challenge of proximity and accessibility to quality ante and post-natal care. He said, “Five out of the eight Maternal and Child Care Centres had been completed and being managed by qualified medical personnel. From 2010 and now, we have a total of 45, 249 babies that have been delivered from the centres. 15, 050 were delivered through caesarian, while 27,497 were normal deliveries. A total number of 514,259 women were also attended to at this period.” He said the handbook would be distributed freely to all pregnant women registered at government hospitals in the state. The Minister for Health, Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu, who was represented at the event by the Chief Medical Director, Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, Professor Akin Oshibogun, said every effort by governments to reduce maternal child mortality was welcome. “The present statistics have shown that 52,000 women die annually. Also, 1,120 women die out of 100, 00 life birth in the country. This is alarming and unacceptable,” he said. The Commissioner for Health, Dr. Jide Idris, said the government decided in 2008 to reverse the high mortality rate in the state by inaugurating a maternal mortality reduction advisory committee made up of relevant stakeholders such as the Society of Obstetricians and gynecologists of Nigeria, Association of Private Medical Practitioners of Nigeria, and National Association of Nurses and Midwives. In his presentation of the handbooks, Senator Olorunnimbe Mamora said adherence to information and recommendations contained in the book would help reduce the maternal and child mortality.