Aisha Buhari promises reduction of maternal, infant mortality

The wife of the President, Mrs. Aisha Buhari, has said that the Federal Government is committed to reducing mother and child deaths in the country.

She said this at the inauguration of ‘ProjectFuture’ at Ikom Local Government Area of Cross River State on Monday.

Mrs. Buhari lamented that the rate of maternal and child mortality in the country was high, a trend, she said, must be reversed in order to give Nigerians a future.

She noted that government was concerned about the well-being of women and children living in the rural areas.

She said, “The Federal Government desires to ensure that maternal and child mortality rate in the country is reversed, and has put in place modalities to enhance primary health institution across the country.”

The President’s wife, who also used the occasion to unveil the Mediatrix Development Foundation, an initiative of Dr. Linda Ayade, said the determination of the President to improve on the health sector informed the Federal Government’s decision to have a functional health centre in each ward in the country.

The wife of the Cross River state governor, Mrs. Ayade , identified the activities of unskilled birth attendants as factors increasing mortality rates in many rural areas.

She said, “In communities where they don’t have skilled birth attendants, pregnant women are taken most times to quacks who deliver babies in unhygienic conditions,”

The Director-General of the Primary Health Care Development Agency in Cross River State, Dr. Beta Edu, said the state was doing everything possible to have a functional primary healthcare centre in each ward across Cross River.

PUNCH.