Integrate Project Partners ENSG on Family Planning, Trains Health Professionals

Enugu State Government says it is partnering with an organization, Integrate Project, to create awareness on family planning.

The Commissioner for Health, Dr. Ikechukwu Obi, said this during the launch of family planning programme by the project on Thursday in Enugu.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that family planning, also known as child spacing, is the ability of individuals and couples to anticipate and attain their desired number of children and spacing and timing of their births.

It is achieved through the use of contraceptive methods and the treatment of involuntary infertility.

The project is co-funded by Merck for Mothers and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which had already been launched in Lagos and Kaduna states and now Enugu.

It is aimed at improving the quality of family planning services delivered by Community Pharmacists (CPs) and Patent and Proprietary Medicine Vendors (PPMVs) through the implementation of a tiered accreditation system and strengthening the quality of service delivery.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that participants were pharmacists and health workers.

Obi said that communities with family planning issues could be addressed using the partnership, through proper utilization to meet up the pressure that exist.

“This is why Enugu State is ever willing to join hands in testing for good things that will benefit people.

“This is the reason we are supporting and partnering with the project. People should try as much as possible to control the number of children they have,” Obi advised.

Dr. George Ugwu, the Chairman, Enugu State Primary Healthcare Development Agency (ESPHDA), said the project was an innovative way of making basic primary care services available for communities without big medical facilities.

According to him, handlers of the project are looking at community pharmacists and substandard pharmacies to add to what they are already doing.

He said “we train them to be able to partner with them to increase the level of services and to offer such services at the community level to enable families to chose the method of family planning they want.

“It has been tried in other states and today, we are trying it here in Enugu,” he said.

Earlier, the Programme Manager, Integrate Project, South-West, Mrs. Bolaji Oladejo, said the training was to increase access to family planning services in Enugu “so that women and communities can access it and make choices.

“If access increases, more people will be reached and barrier removed.”

She explained that 5,530 health providers would be engaged in 11 states of the federation, while 300 would be trained in Enugu, adding that the project which started in 2021 in Lagos and Kaduna would end by 2026 after training health professionals in the 11 states.

Oladejo added that participants would be expected to go out with the information they have and be good ambassadors of family planning and support the project.

“They are expected to return to their health facilities fully equipped with the knowledge and skills gained to improve the quality of family planning services rendered in their communities,” she added.
End