2017 FP Summit: Kano, development partners host satellite event on child spacing

As part of satellite activities leading to the 2017 Global Family Planning Summit scheduled for July 11 in London, the Kano state government and international development partners working in the state Friday hosted a roundtable discussion on child birth spacing (CBS) with stakeholders including traditional and religious leaders as well as young women.

“This year, just past the halfway mark to 2020—presents an ideal opportunity to commit to more urgent and intensified action to accelerate progress to the Family Planning 2020 (FP2020) goals and our shared vision of universal access to sexual and reproductive health, as laid out in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development,” said a statement by 2017 Family Planning Summit.

Speaking at the satellite event, Kabiru Getso, Kano state’s commissioner of health said there was need for expanding access to family planning and child birth spacing (FP/CBS) services by women to arrest the “unfavorable” indices of reproductive healthcare in the state by raising people’s awareness about FP/CBS in underserved communities.

“Sixty two percent of women in reproductive age [in Kano state] do not have information on family planning; healthcare facilities should make services available and accessible. There is need for sensitization of women and youth on healthy child birth spacing; only when community members are aware of services they will [be able to] seek for them,” says Getso.

Speaking to African Newspage on addressing the challenge of access to information about FP and child spacing services, Mukhtar Gadanya of the Nigeria Urban Reproductive Health Initiative (NURHI2) which is working to improve access to FP/CBS services Nigeria says, as part of the satellite events, NURHI2 was organizing a training on how to improve provider-client interaction regarding CBS in the state, for MNCH coordinators in all the 44 local government areas of Kano state.

“NURHI2 has trained about 120 members of Ward Development Committees/Facility Health Comittees (WDCs/FHCs) on voice and accountability for CBS in Kano. We have trained journalists and bloggers on CBS, and established a functional advocacy core group and media forum for CBS,” adds Gadanya

The roundtable discussion which was themed: ‘Child Spacing: Empowering the People, Developing the Nation’ was organized by Kano government in partnership with UK’s Department for International Development (DFID), as well as DFID-funded Maternal, Newborn and Child Health (MNCH2) and Women for Health (W4H) programmes, among others. Others were the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) and Marie Stopes International.