By Kazeem Akolawole
The federal government has disclosed that despite interventions by governments at all levels, and with partners’ support, there is still a huge unmet need for family planning especially in rural communities and hard-to-reach areas.
The Director, Family Health Department, Federal Ministry of Health, Dr. Bolade Alonge at the 2023 annual family planning technical review meeting in Abuja, said blamed this on non-accessibility of family planning information and services especially in low-resource settings and the huge funding gap for the procurement of family planning commodities.
Alonge who was represented by the Director, Health Promotion, Dr Ladidi Bako- Aiyegbusi while quoting the 2021 Nigeria Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS), said the demand for family planning services among married or in-union women is only satisfied in 4 out of every 10 women.
She said the government has added new commodities to the method mix like the DMPA-SC, with the Self Injection component, Hormonal IUD, and Levoplant so that more women of reproductive age can access a wide range of commodities of their choice.
According to her, a recently conducted study in 2020 identified some client’s barriers to family planning uptake to include education, desire for more children, uncertainty about its need, partner disapproval, previous side effects, religious beliefs, culture disapproval, age, marital status, wealth index, residence, ignorance, embarrassment, domestic violence and sexual factor.
“Additionally, the delivery and uptake of contraception have remained a major developmental challenge in Africa. Given the enormous challenges enumerated above as factors inhibiting family planning uptake there is an urgent call for partners and stakeholders to dialogue and foster a way forward so we can collectively achieve our set targets and that every woman or couple has access to safe and quality FP services at all Service Delivery Points (SDPs) spread across the entire nation.”
The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA)Family Planning and Maternal Health Technical Specialist, Adeela Khen said: “As we move forward, we face more and more funding gaps as the contribution becomes so important, particularly in this year 2023, where we’re looking at almost 80% gap and that’s where we are presently”. She added
