By Rauf Oyewole
The Malaria and Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs) Youth Corps, a non-governmental organisation has mobilised women and youth to sensitise communities in Bauchi State on access to quality health care delivery and addressing challenges that are contributing to prevalence of malaria.
A co-Team Lead, Giving Promise while speaking yesterday at Miri Primary Health Care facility lamented the malaria burden on Nigeria, saying that the country accounts for the largest cases of malaria and that impedes on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2030.
He said that the organisation discovered that married women need consent of their husbands before accessing health care for themselves and their children which perhaps contributes to medical emergencies when delayed. “Many of the women confirmed that it is culturally accepted.”
Promise said that the exercise, which is under the Gender Equality Project being supported by The Global Fund and African Leaders Malaria Alliance (ALMA), is to entrench accountability in health services –especially malaria and to drive female-led advocacy. “Basically we are engaging the community stakeholders to know their challenges, the bottleneck and barriers in accessing health care services,” he said.
Also speaking, Gender Focal Point of MNTDs in Nigeria, Grace Atinuke Felix, expressed worry over the barriers against women in accessing health care services in the rural communities, saying that gender imbalance and cultural inhibitions count against women.
According to Atinuke, “Women have to seek consent before they can access health care services and their children. We all know that there are women related issues that are better handled by women health workers but we were told that there are not enough health care workers to balance it out. We are going to work and engage the concerned authorities in this regard.”
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