Some rural women in Kaduna State on Wednesday urged the State Government to improve access to family planning services in remote areas.

The women made the call in separate interviews in Kugu, Zaria Local Government Area of the state.

Madam Binta Ya’u, a rural dweller, said that many women wanted family planning services, but faced challenges of either non-availability of such facility in remote areas or were disallowed by their husbands.

According to her, many pregnant women are either dying before delivery or lose the babies because they got pregnant almost immediately after delivery, when their bodies are not ready for such burden.

“The government should help in ensuring that all health facilities in rural communities have the services.

“But also of importance is the need for the government to enlighten our husbands to understand the health risk of not allowing the body to rest well, before getting pregnant again,” she said.

Another rural woman, Mrs Mairo Abubakar, said that their husbands were only interested in satisfying their sexual desire at the expense of their wives’ health.

She said that even where such services were provided, the health official would insist that their husbands must be around, and that the services must be provided with their consent.

“But our husbands will take advantage of this and refuse to go to the facility with us.

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“We really need government to come to our aid, provide the services and talk to our men to support us in accessing the services,’’ Abubakar said.

Principal Investigator, Dr. Elizabeth Omoluabi, said that Anambra ranked fourth in Performance Monitoring and Accountability (PMA) 2020 Survey conducted in 2016 in seven states on the use of modern contraceptives for family planning and prevention of pregnancy.

 

Omoluabi said that the PMA 2020 Round One showed that only 17.5 per cent of women in the state had access to modern family planning methods. She said the state placed fourth behind Lagos, Rivers and Nasarawa states, while Kaduna was sixth with 16.1 per cent.

 

Taraba scored 9.6 per cent, while Kano State had 6.0 per cent of the seven states, where the Round One of the project was carried out.

 

According to her, the Federal Government has promised that the country would make family planning available to 36 per cent of its women in 2018. (NAN) FDY/FLP/MST