In Kaduna State, Northwest Nigeria, the issue of maternal and newborn deaths are still giving relevant authorities and individuals a serious concern.
Though this is not the only state where the issue of women dying around childbirth is on the high side despite campaigns by relevant government’s agencies and non-governmental organisations working around maternal health in the State, the circumstances in which many of them die is what keep people wondering.
Major causes of these avoidable deaths among women and under-five children is their lack of, or poor access to primary healthcare centres by most of reproductive age women, majority of whom reside at the grassroots.
Kaduna has a projection of 1.85 million Women of Reproductive Age (WRA) and over 1,500 public health facilities providing services, according to Society for Family Health 2018. Out of the facilities some are no longer functioning to capacity including that of Chukula.
Of course, this was partly due to negligence of health sector by government over the years until lately, when the State government, due to massive advocacies on maternal and newborn health and its economic value, began to take action to address the age long issue that has sent many to their early grave, while their family members bore the pains orchestrated by the phenomenon.
The tour and study of the community, called Chukula and its adjoining villages in Kagarko Local Government Area of Kaduna State where issue of antenatal care, delivery and postnatal remain a luxury, painted a scenario best left untold except for the sake of possible intervention.
About Chukula
Chukula is about 212 kilometers from Kaduna, the State Capital. The major tribes here are Koro and Gwari.
Their major occupation is farming for those living within the community while some of their sons and daughters are in business in both public and private sectors outside the area.
The community’s efforts
Since maternal care remains a challenge for many reproductive age women, newborn and children in this axis of Kaduna that shares border with Nasarawa State, they had sometime ago, built a PHC for themselves through self help.
According to the natives, after building the facilities with bricks, the state government deployed health workers who were working at the facility until it became dilapidated due to lack of necessary routine maintenance.
As a result of the dilapidation, the health workers earlier posted to the facility , stopped coming gradually, and by the time the condition got worse, they stopped coming completely.
Against this backdrop, the villagers including children, aged and pregnant women most of whom are generally poor and could not bear the cost of transportation and medication available at private health facilities even after a minimum of two hours journey on motorcycles, resorted to self help.
Natives tell their story
Though pregnancy should be a thing of joy, but here, whenever this happens, the family have to depend on traditional herbs better known in medical parlance as tradomedic, experienced old women and prayer until their wives, mothers, sisters or daughters put to bed.
Besides lack of healthcare facilities and skilled health worker in the community, the road from nearby major town called Kubacha is not motorable.
Only motorcycles are able to manoeuvre the rough, rocky and slippery route at a minimum cost of N2,000 to-and-fro Chukula to where a Missionary Hospital is located.
Many of the reproductive age women lament the high cost of bike fare due to limited cash flow.
The imagery of a woman in child labour being conveyed on a motorcycle to such a long distance for delivery calls for serious concern from relevant authorities and kind-spirited individuals.
Distance apart, the low patronage of mainstream health facilities may also be due to the quality of services rendered by the medical staff at all levels of the healthcare system in the state – Children and Women’s Rights in Nigeria: A Wake-up Call (Situation Assessment and Analysis 2001).
Patients often complain of discourteous staff, long waiting hours due to under staffing and the frequent non availability of essential drugs at the facilities.
Traditional Head, Chukula, Chief Paul Adrha told this correspondent that, taking a sick person to the nearest hospital is a serious problem to community most especially pregnant women. He added that some time the sick person died along the road because of inaccessibility.
“We have other villages here. These other villages, Nkojo, Kusam 3, Kusam 4, were equally benefiting from the PHC in those days when it was working. So you can see what it means to have one in Chukula which serves as the centre for others.
“Talking about the old PHC which is no longer habitable, I’m ready to work with people from other villages. People that share in my dream of uplifting our people. I want to work with anybody that want our progress whether they come from the community or elsewhere and not those that will bring problems for us.
“So, what I’m saying in fewer words is that, we need help. We need functional PHC around here where it will take our daughters, wives, sisters and mothers just a few minutes to access and we are open to partnership that can make that happen”, he added.