The reasons for high parity and maternal death in Nigeria!

The issues of maternal death is a topical issue in the less developed African nations of the world. This is as a result of the recent focus on sustainable development due to the high maternal death in many developing countries.

In Nigeria, maternal death is very high and one of the highest in the world with clinical, social, cultural and demographic factors perceived to worsen the situation.

Maternal mortality is the death of a woman, resulting from pregnancy or within 42 days of termination of pregnancy irrespective of the duration and cause of death (WHO 2012).

According to the WHO, more than 536,000 women die as a result of complications during pregnancy and childbirth (WHO 2007) WHILE more than 10 Million more suffer dilapidating ailments and permanent disabilities (UN 2007).

In Nigeria, maternal death have been largely connected to the multi-parity (Parity is the number of times a woman has given birth to a foetus with gestational age of 24 weeks or more, regardless of whether the child was born alive or was a still birth - Emily, Willyanne, and John 2013) level of the Nigerian women.

Together with Nigeria's high Total Fertility Rate (TFR) of 5.13 per woman, the patriarchal nature of most African society that place male child above their female counterpart and many cultural beliefs, norms and values, e.g. Preference for Male Child, Social Security (Form of Insurance) for parents at Old Age, Low Status of Women in the African Society, Large Family Syndrome of most African families, etc., that ends up influencing the parity level of the Nigerian woman.

In conclusion, maternal death is indisputably the leading cause of death among women of reproductive ages in the less developed countries of the world with Africa and Nigeria having the largest brunt of it. With a population of over 180 million people, poor and hungry, lack of adequate health care, lack of jobs, natural disasters, communal crises, terrorist attacks/insurgency, militancy, diseases, political and cultural mischiefs, it is high time we evolve along side the world.

The US of today was not always like this. It took the courage of liked minds to build a US of there dreams.

More so, Dubai, China, India, South Africa, Etc.

Hence, its time we reconsider and prioritize the lives of our mothers against this menace of maternal death.

Our mothers are the best asset we can ever have. Therefore, we pray for God's continual blessing for all mothers!

We love you mothers! For all the uncountable burdens you'd to go through to give birth to us and nurture us to adulthood. For your uncondition love, care and prayers. For all your support and kind words. Today, we've come to appreciate the intensity of a mothers love and the role of a mother in a man's life.

Mothers a worth celebrating, hence, learn to celebrate every female child today!