Young Malama Asabe Inuwa, a 16 year old Arabic school instructor who lived in a satellite town in Abuja was forced into marriage with Dan Auta, a 56 year old petty trader. She became pregnant shortly after the marriage. On the day of her delivery a woman was brought to the house to deliver her of the baby of which after losing so much blood, Asabe died without seeing her first child. Apart from having immature uterus, Asabe was attended to by a non qualified mid-wife.
Bunmi was a mother of five children who were born with barely 1 year and 3 months gap in-between them; she gave up the ghost when she went to deliver the 6th baby. Doctor said she died as a result of shortage in haemoglobin level (blood level) which could have been easily solved with iron supplements.
Amaka was a young undergraduate, full of life and expectations; she lost her life after procuring abortion from a quack that could not differentiate her womb from her intestine. Amaka made a choice not to carry the baby to term because she was raped by a gang of armed robbers.
The situations above are referred to as maternal mortality cases where a woman’s death is linked to pregnancy before birth or 42 days after the delivery of that child. There are lots of issues relating to high maternal mortality in Nigeria.
The several roads that link to death of women before or after birth of a baby include: female genital mutilation, otherwise known as female circumcision, unwanted pregnancy resulting in the most dreaded topic ‘abortion’, early marriage, lack or inadequate sex education especially in the use of contraceptives, inadequate health care facilities and above all poverty.
One of the core issues that contribute to increase in pregnancy related deaths is the mostly avoided issue of abortion. What is abortion? Abortion according to Wikipedia “is the intentional termination of a pregnancy after conception. It allows women to put an end to their pregnancies, but involves killing the undeveloped embryo or fetus.” This definition surely makes abortion a controversial issue as it involves “killing the undeveloped embryo”.
In Nigeria, abortion is legal to some extent; it is accepted as legal when it is performed with the intention of saving the mother’s life. This brings us to the question, how do we recognize abortion performed with the intention of saving the mother’s life?
Apart from life saving, a lot of reasons can make a woman, irrespective of her religion seek for abortion, like the case of Amaka above, she made a choice to terminate the unwanted pregnancy but due to some reasons which could range from restrictive abortion laws to lack of health care facility within the range she could afford, having no choice, she decided to patronize a quack with only one thought of doing away with armed robber’s pregnancy.
Against the intention of the law makers, Abortion laws in Nigeria as restrictive as they are, have made unsafe abortion a silent and persistent pandemic, especially as it constitutes11% - 13% maternal mortality rate.
Where abortion is legalized and women are allowed to make their own choice, abortion is the safest procedure, where it is not; women who feel they desperately need to terminate a pregnancy resort to quacks and this lead to death which result in 70,000 maternal deaths and 5 million disabilities per year worldwide.
Unsafe abortion as major contributor to maternal mortality rate in Nigeria leads to about 34,000 deaths of Nigerian women each year. According to a study conducted in 1996, 610,000 abortions take place each year in which 142,000 resulted in complications. With increase in population, 760,000 abortions were recorded by 2006 which means the number of death is likely higher. This also means that, unofficially, one in 10 Nigerian women of child bearing age have had an abortion.
This signifies that, abortion cut across both married and single women with the circumstances of the pregnancy being the decision making factor.
Though government intensifies efforts in curbing the menace of maternal mortality resulting from child birth through the introduction of Midwife Service Scheme (MSS) which is an intervention born out of the goodwill of some well meaning Nigerians and have been paying off as maternal mortality death rate is reducing, but the bigger killer is the abortion which had become inevitable in various houses due to poverty level in the country.
Married women procure abortion because they dare not, due to poverty carry that particular child to term and have it delivered for fear of providing basic needs for that child as in the case of Bunmi who was not educated in the use of contraceptive as a measure of avoiding unwanted pregnancy.
For Nigeria to meet one of its targets of Millennium Developmental Goals (MDGs) there is need to reduce maternal mortality death to the barest minimum.
This can be achieved through sex education which starts invariably in children from birth. The need to advocate more on the use of contraceptives, initiate midwifery scheme in every nook and cranny of the country and also mobilise and sensitise women on the need to access the services by ensuring them it is available and free.
There is need for government to review the abortion law most of which had been there since 18th century and are no longer adequate for present day generation and are not in conformity with the Human Rights Implication of unsafe Abortion.
Since abortion is inevitable due to several factors as poverty, illiteracy, low moral standard resulting in lawlessness. Government should develop a political will of having a second look at these laws. If Nigerian women must procure abortion, there should be provision for cheap and save abortion within the confines of the law based on choice of the woman as the bearer of the brunt.
It is therefore recommended that all international and regional instruments that promote women’s health should be domesticated; harmful traditional practices such as female circumcision should be legislated against, more empowerment programs for women and also gender equality.
The bottom line is that women are dying of unsafe abortion everyday and our law should therefore be reformed to include areas that will proffer solutions.
http://www.peoplesdaily-online.com/news/healthy-living/31455-maternal-mortality-need-for-women-to-make-their-choice
