The federal government has been urged to provide an improved equitable health system that will cater for the wellbeing of women and children in the country as a key requirement to move the nation out of its current poor health indices.
Civil society organizations of the PACFaH@Scale project disclosed this on Thursday in a statement signed by Dr Ejike Oji, Project Director of the Association for the Advancement of Family Planning to mark the International Health Day.
The CSOs draw the attention of the federal government to the need to put in place key recommendations for a fairer and more equitable health system for women, especially rural women.
“As the world commemorates the world health day, today, 7 April 2021, the 23 civil society organizations of the PACFaH@Scale project align with the 2021 theme which focuses on fairness, equality and access in the health system. Coming just three weeks after International Women’s Day, the World Health Day provides an opportunity to reflect on the challenges experienced by women as primary health seekers of child and family health,” he said.
The group then recommended for greater inclusion of women and women’s associations in health program design, implementation and monitoring platforms at national and sub-national levels.
Oji added that although gender-based budgeting has been experimented with over the years in Nigeria, it has not gained traction in the country adding that despite numerous investments by donors supporting open government and open budget initiatives. He, therefore, called for a more gender responsive budgeting to tackle the myriad of health challenges facing women and children in Nigeria.
“But perhaps most importantly is the recommendation for greater investment in creating a new generation of female health champions to engage the government with evidence and conviction on the imperative of making existing primary health care centers functional rather than building new ones,” he said.