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The Incidence Of Maternal And Child Mortality
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At the end of the last century, sub-Saharan Africa still had high
maternal and child mortality rate with the goals of safe motherhood
eluding many governments. A documentary report on Nigeria Television
Authority (NTA) precisely 3rd May, 2007 revealed that malaria fever is
very dangerous to pregnant mothers and children and more deadly then
HIV/AIDS. The number of these groups malaria kills in one year is said
to be what HIV/AIDS kills in 15 years. According to Dr. Adekunle (an NTA
discussant, he stated also that over 80 percent of 270 to 400 million
clinical cases occur in the African continent). Similarly, on the 30th
of March 2007, another documentary on the same station, (NTA) suggests
that children under the age of five and a total of 300,000 Nigeria
children and eleven out of hundred pregnant women die of malaria fever
every year.
Apart from the death rate being recorded due to malaria
fever of both pregnant women and children, it was reported on the Africa
Independent Television (AIT) on the 6th August 2007 at the 8:00pm news
that Nigeria spends over 130 billion naira on malaria control. Alubo
(1997) opined that:
Women in Nigeria suffer from all kinds of ailment
and ill conditions and run the risk of sudden deaths in child birth.
The main causes of this sudden death in child birth are obstructed
labour, uterine infection, anaemia, ectopic pregnancy and cepsis etc.
These
complications according to Alubo (1997) account for maternal mortality
during labour and after child birth. All the factors by Alubo, as well
as the previous presentations of the concept under study revealed that
women suffer undue hardship during and after pregnancy. To put it right,
many factors and complications can lead to maternal and child mortality
as stated all through but of interest is the impact of poverty on
maternal and child mortality and it is of sociological importance to
identify how poverty affect the health of the mother and the child and
the definite responses of government.
1.2 BRIEF HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF JOS NORTH
Jos
North area council shares its boundaries with Jos South Local
Government Area in the south and East, Bassa Local Government Area in
the West and Turo Local Government Area of Bauchi State in the North.
Jos
North metropolis is made up of one district; Gwong and fourteen (14)
wards, namely Abba Na Shehu, Ibrahim Kashim, Jos Jarawa, Gangere,
Vandapuye, Tafawa Belewa, Jenta Apata, Jenta Adamu, Garba Dawo, Dalhatu,
Alikazaure Sarkin Arab, Tudun Wada, Kabong Naraguta “A†and Naraguta
“Bâ€. According to its geographical location, Jos is about four hundred
(400) feet above sea level and temperature sometimes goes near freezing
point. Rainfall usually occurs between April to October yearly. The
month of December, January and February are particularly very cold due
to dry wind of the harmattan, as well as its latitude and hilly nature.
It is also on table land and its vegetation is characterized by
scattered forest reserves and farmlands. However, Jos is a built up
area, but some of its inhabitants areas are surrounded by hills, the
temperature nature of Jos makes tourism a potential industry.
1.3 STATEMENT OF THE RESEARCH PROBLEM
Maternal
and child mortality as earlier mentioned above are not strange problems
in our society. They are as old as human existence but the trend and
pattern varies across generations and socio-economic lines. In this work
however, the researcher is interested in unfolding the link between
poverty (socio-economic status) in the family with maternal and child
mortality. Death of mothers and children are painful experiences that
affect families and also have it’s toll on the society and the economy.
Maternal
and child mortality is not an uncommon event in several parts of the
developing world. Mothers and children are at highest risk for disease
and death. While motherhood is often a possible and fulfilling
experience for too many women, it is associated with ill-health and even
death (Olatoye, 2009). The death of a woman during pregnancy, labor or
peuriperium is a tragedy that carries a huge burden of grief and pain,
and has been described as a major public health problem in developing
countries. Women have an enormous impact on their families’ welfare.
Deaths of infant/children under five are peculiar and closely related to
maternal health. One million children die each year because their
mother died, and the risk of death of children less than five years
doubles if mothers die in child birth. More than 25,000 children die
everyday and every minute a woman dies in child birth. Worldwide, every
year about 500,000 women die due to child birth and over 9 million
children under age five die mostly from preventable and diseases. (WHO,
2003).
Available evidence indicates that Africa accounts for the
highest burden of mortality among women and children in the world
(Udofia and Okonofua, 2000; Prata. Et al, 2008).
In the light of the
above, the researcher, who is a social work student of University of
Jos, a woman and a mother who has observed with keen interest, over
the years the prevalence of the above situation in Jos North area of
Plateau state on how mother and children die of this preventable
situation and has therefore, embarked on the research using Plateau
State Specialist Hospital has her resource/data collection base.
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