Lagos State Governor, Mr. Babatunde Fashola, SAN, yesterday launched the Maternal and Child Care Mortality Reduction Programme in the state, noting that the state has built eight Maternal and Child Care (MCC) Hospitals in the past five years to provide life saving services to mothers and children.

The Governor, who spoke at the Blueroof Hall, LTV 8 Complex Agidingbi, said five have gone into full operation, while out of the remaining three, two have been completed with training of staff that have been specially recruited to be familiar with the equipment and the facilities before being deployed as is currently going on.

Governor Fashola said government is not done yet as at this year it has awarded another two MCCs in Badagry and Epe to ensure that the project to reduce distance to hospital for pregnant women, is state wide and all embracing.

Governor Fashola, who took a retrospective look at the programme, said it is a project within a comprehensive programme that started in 2007.

He added that when he was elected as governor one of the challenges he resolved to confront was the unacceptable index of women of children or both who losing their lives in the process of child-bearing.

He said his interactions with professionals in the medical fields both within the state service and private sector showed the many causes of infant and maternal mortality which were many and varied.

Among them were the issues of diet, lifestyle, undiagnosed non-communicable diseases like hypertension and diabetes, complications during pregnancy, quackery, distance to properly equipped hospitals which sometimes lead to fatalities during emergencies.

The Governor who gave a status report on each of the factors said as at today, government has resolved a number of them and still has its hands on the plough to overcome those that are still receiving attention.

On diabetes and hypertension screening and treatment which was one of the first to be flagged off at Ifako -Ijaiye on assumption of office, between 2007 and July 2012, a total of 96,468 people have been screened and screening is still continuing.

"What was most revealing was the lack of knowledge about our people and women of child bearing age about the lifestyle choices and what they eat and how this pre-disposes them to risk during pregnancy."

"Of course, there were cultural issues about the gender preference in our society and not a few women have lost their lives in order to have a child of a particular
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Great one from Fash

I hail

Mimiko did something similar. Big ups to you guys