2,300 under-5-year children die daily in Nigeria — Health Commissioner

BENUE State Commissioner for Health and Human Services, Prof. Joseph Ngbea, yesterday, disclosed that about 2,300 under five-year children and 145 women of child bearing age die daily in Nigeria of preventive diseases. 

Ngbea, while flagging off the first round of Maternal, Newborn and Child Health Week, MNCHW, in Makurdi, lamented that “Nigeria has one of the highest death rates in the world among young children and women of child-bearing age, and the trend is not improving satisfactorily.” 

Quoting the Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey, NDHS, he said: “These deaths are often preventable with relatively simple measures. NDHS in 2018 estimated that Nigeria makes up only two percent of the World’s population but accounts for 14 percent of the global maternal death burden. 

“One in every eight Nigerian children dies before their 15 birthday. Nearly 10 percent of newborn deaths occur in Nigeria. Everyday Nigeria loses about 2,300 under five children and 145 women of child bearing age. An estimated 10 percent of these deaths are often preventable with relatively simple measures.” 

He explained that the MNCHW was organised yearly “to deliver an integrated package of highly cost-effective, yet result-oriented promotive, preventive and curative services. 

“These services are delivered to strengthen routine services at health facilities. The mechanism is used to consolidate services that immediately demonstrate impact.”

Executive Secretary of the state Primary Health Care Board, Mrs. Ashi Wende, on her part, said the week-long biannual event which presents the opportunity to scale up health services “is a strategy to deliver free package of high impact and cost effective interventions. 

She said: “These interventions are essential to improving the health of women of child bearing age as well as children under the age of five years in Nigeria. Its main aim is to deliver a package of basic services proven to be highly effective in the reduction of mortality and morbidity among mothers and their children."

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