By Aisha A. A.
Investment in Family planning is a key to sustaining the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), as target 3.7 of the SGDs, calls on countries to ensure universal access to sexual and reproductive health-care services including for family planning, information and education and the integration of reproductive health into national strategies and programmes by 2030.
This commitment has set governments moving to meet up the goal as fast as they can, yet in Jigawa state Nigeria, the figures are still low, based on available evidences.
At Kudai Health facility in Dutse local government area of Jigawa state, Mariya Umar, 23, in an interview with our reporter, revealed that she came receive the services with her husband’s consent.
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She said that after having a lengthy discussion, the couple came to a conclusion to space their children due to economic hardship and other issues.
Young Mrs Umar claimed that she has two children out of her 3 year old marriage and thus the need to space for her husband to be able to cater for the needs of the family.
She is amongst the many young men in Jigawa state to have obtained full Knowledge of Family planning services available and have decided to make the best use of it.
Also, Mrs Hadiza Muhammed 25 and a mother of three, said they have agreed to access Family Planning because of security and the morality issue surrounding children.
On weither they have obtained a signal from their parents, Mrs Muhammed said the decision is only for her and her husband and they have already reached a conclusion.
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At Sakwaya health facility, a health care provider, Amina Usman, said a reasonable number of women want to access Family Planning services but are scared of stigmatization.
She confirmed that availability of Family Planning commodities is seasonal and consumables are not always available to be given free of charge.
Inspite of the indication that some portion of young women in Jigawa, are enlightened about Family Planning, Dr Shehu Sambo, the Director Jigawa state Primary Health Care Development Agency, said there is only 3.6 percent contraceptive prevalence rate in the state.
The above statement means that the percentage of women of Reproductive age of (15-49) who use contraceptives in Jigawa state, is very low due to many underlying reasons.
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He emphasized that family planning is important for any community to develop and for women to be healthy enough to cater for their children.
Dr Sambo however, outlined some issues that deter the provision of quality Family Planning services in Jigawa state, which includes shortage of staff and trainings, lack of funding and partnerships as well as uncleared misconceptions on Family Planning.
The Director further appealed to the media, to enlighten the public on the advantage of modern Family Planning and its benefit to the families and the nation at large.
In a move to support the state on family planning and the use of contraceptives, Development Communications Network (DEVCom), in collaboration with the TCI, organised a three-day training for Journalists in Jigawa state.
Mrs Sekyen Dadik, a representative of Devcom, tasked the media on raising the consciousness of the people on Family Planning as a civic responsibility equal to voting.
She challenged the media on paying a greater attention to family planning issues to showcase in the media, in order to save lives and livelihoods.
According to her, “there is need for the media, to help clear misgivings and prejudices against accessing child spacing services and other family planning issues.”
Moreso, Mrs Dadik reflected on targets of the SDGs that directly addressed Family planning issues, saying that the rationale behind Family Planning is to space child birth, to limit number of children, to plan the desired number of children and to prevent unwanted pregnancy.
During the training, Mrs Aliya Ahmed, the state Reproductive Health Coordinat at the State Primary Health Care Development Agency, gave an overview of traditional and modern contraceptives.
She disclosed the effects of all the methods and appealed to the media to enlighten the public on accessing the services.
The The Challenge Initiative program Manager in Jigawa state, Mr Ankale Kongude, highlighted that in order to accelerate the fulfillment of the FP2020(2030) commitment, there is need for all stakeholders to work together to strengthen demand for a full range of contraceptive methods of FP services.
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Also, he said there is need to target the youths population, increase coverage and access to high quality integrated FP services and commodities through the private sector, including faith based organisations, private hospitals, pharmacies appropriate for some methods.
Mr Kongude, further advocates for strengthening the capacity of health-care workers to provide safe, high quality Family Planning services, monitor and evaluate systems and processes.
The Challenge initiative(TCI), is a platform that enables governments to scale up high impact Family planning and Adolescent Youths Sexual and Reproductive Health approaches for urban poor. It represents an innovative approach to develop and strengthen the understanding of scale, impact, efficiency and sustainability.
Its goal is to support state governments to achieve self reliance to scale up Family Planning and Adolescent Youths and Reproductive Sexual Health high impact intervention leading to improvement in urban health systems and increased use of modern contraception especially amongst the urban poor.