Experts in maternal and newborn have calculated that if all Nigerian women had access to the services provided by midwives, then the lives of over 840,000 mothers and babies could be saved by 2015.
MamaYe-Evidence4Action (E4A) is today calling on Prof C. O. Onyebuchi Chukwu, the Minister for Health, to urgently address the shortage in the required number of midwives, unequal distribution of available midwives and ensure obligations to all midwives fulfilled to motivate them stay at facilities and help Nigerian mothers deliver safely. Midwives play a vital role in supporting women throughout their pregnancy as well as being trained to manage complications at birth. Many midwives travel long distances and work long hours to give high quality care to women in their community. Experts in maternal and newborn have calculated that if all Nigerian women had access to the services provided by midwives, then the lives of over 840,000 mothers and babies could be saved by 2015.Speaking on behalf of the MamaYe-E4A campaign, Dr Tunde Segun said: “It is right that we honour our midwives on International Day of the Midwife. We applaud the Government’s commitment to strengthen its free maternal health policy and progress made from the midwives service scheme, but more needs to be done to expand this critical workforce.”According to the 2008 Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey, only 39% of deliveries were attended by skilled birth attendants. This corroborates data published in the State of the World’s Midwives report, which shows that Nigeria has less than 50% of the midwives required to take about 6 million deliveries, which take place each year in Nigeria. Dr Segun added: “We are calling on the Nigerian government to do everything in its power to ensure we have required number of midwives, they are equitably distributed and to continue fulfilling financial and other obligations to enable all women access skilled care. We are also inviting Nigerians to show their appreciation for midwives – and help inspire our youth to become midwives in the future. You can do this by tweeting a thank you message for their hard work, or send us a picture of an inspirational midwife from your community.”Join the conversation to find out more about midwives on May 5th at 4pm on twitter (#MidwivesNigeria). You can also visit www.mamaye.org to find out more about the state of Nigeria’s midwives and find easy to understand evidence, stories of heroes and heroines, commitments made by the Government and different actions you can take for this important cause. Make your voice heard and demand more, join the MamaYe-E4A campaign.