Chioma Umeha
In today’s Nigeria, where the economy is
consistently on the downward trend, raising healthy and happy children poses a
great challenge. This is not helped by the poor state of the country’s
healthcare which has given rise to high child and maternal death rate.
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) recent
statistics indicates that every single day, Nigeria loses about 2,300
under-five-year olds and 145 women of childbearing age, making the country the
second largest contributor to the under-five and maternal mortality rate in the
world.
Incidentally, this high mortality rate of mother
and child can be reduced through family planning such as abstinence, natural
planning, use of contraceptives, hormonal birth control, etc.
However, lack of child spacing has been identified
by health experts as one of the highest contributors to high mortality rate of
mother and child.
Health experts recommend at least two years in
between two births. Indeed, family planning experts believe that there is a
correlation between children’s and mothers’ health and the intervals between
births. They posit that “the mortality rate among children born at intervals of
less than one year, is twice higher than among children born at intervals of
two years or more.”
A study conducted in 2017 and published online by
BMC Women’s Health in a
qualitative study among urban Nigerians reports that inadequate birth spacing
is perceived as riskier than all family planning methods, except sterilisation
and abortion. This shows the need for couples to regulate the intervals between
pregnancies, to promote safe pregnancy and birth of healthy babies.
Indeed, birth spacing has other advantages. For
instance, it enables the body of the mother to have enough time to replace lost
nutrients after birth before another pregnancy. Thus, she would have more
energy and ample opportunity to bond with her child. Moreover, parents would
have more time and less financial stress in caring for the family.
Furthermore, the baby born at the expected time
would have a healthy weight, develop very well and consequently perform well in
school because the mother has enough time to nurse it. On the other hand, lack
of child spacing may result in having unwanted pregnancies that may also lead
to unsafe abortions.
It is of common knowledge that couples who fail to
plan their family often run into the problem of having unwanted pregnancies.
When that happens, they may resort to having the babies aborted.
Worst still is where such abortion is carried out
by quacks under unhygienic conditions. Such abortion may even complicate
matters resulting in ailments such as abdominal pain, abnormal vaginal
bleeding, vaginal infection or infertility.
Other health issues such as high blood pressure,
anaemia, uterine and placenta problems may arise from unsafe abortion. Regrettably, abortion may lead to
death. This is apart from the fact that abortion is illegal in the country.
It costs a lot to maintain the health of babies
born at short intervals because they are susceptible to frequent ailments.
Studies have shown that the children of couples
who adopt family are healthy, beautiful and bouncing with less medical
attention.
Perhaps, Federal Ministry of Health and other
interventionist agencies should invest in child spacing programmes to prevent high infant and maternal
mortality rate in the country.
Since ignorance is at the root of the problem,
adequate child spacing should be an integral part of pre-natal and ante-natal
programmes in our health institutions.
The government needs to re-evaluate the country’s
health education programmes in schools with the objective of emphasising on
health benefits of child spacing and other family planning methods. This is
important as a healthy family is a healthy nation.
Also, Churches and faith-based organisations
should place a premium on a pre-marriage course so that intending couples would
be well-equipped to confront the challenges of childbirth, upbringing, spacing
etc.
Couples should know that failing to plan their
families is planning to fail.
