Wike Wants Stakeholders To Implement Neonatal Deaths Plan

Sogbeba Dokubo

Wife of the Rivers State Governor, Justice Suzette Nyesom Wike, has charged stakeholders to ensure that the Rivers State Every Newborn Action Plan (RIENAP) is implemented as planned.
Giving the charge, Monday, at the launch of the RIENAP and her investiture as the State’s “ Newborn Champion” at the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA) House, Port Harcourt, the state’s First Lady said the plan must not end up on the table.
“Let this not be another document that will not be implemented. Let it not sit on your table and gather dust. There must be a concerted effort to ensure its implementation”, she said.
Represented by Barr. Inime Aguma at the occasion, the Governor’s wife tasked the stakeholders particularly the state Ministry of Health to come up with a monitoring and evaluation mechanism to ensure implementation of the plan.
“You must set up something that will monitor them to ensure that they do what they ought to do at that level, because in Port Harcourt metropolis we have so many hospitals, we have private clinics, government hospitals and people have access to better health care.
“But at the local level, it’s a huge problem, and I’m sure that most of the threat occur at that level”, she noted.
Justice Wike, however assured her commitment towards the implementation of the plan, saying that whatever is required of her to give to enhance the smooth implementation of the plan, she will make available at all times.
Earlier in her speech, the Permanent Secretary, Rivers State Ministry of Health, Mrs Caroline Wali had given a brief statistics of neonatal deaths in identified years globally, Nigeria, and Rivers State.
“In Rivers State, the prevalence of neonatal death was 27 deaths for every 1000 births, and still birth rate of 42.9 deaths for every 1000 births (multi-indicator), cluster survey 2016 – 17)”, she said.
Consequently, she continued , “without a push to end this deaths, we will not reach the goal endorsed by 193 countries to end all preventable newborn deaths by 2030!
In his goodwill message, the Health Specialist, UNICEF, Rivers Field Office, Port Harcourt, Dr Eghe Abe, explained that UNICEF decision to be involved in checking neonatal deaths in Rivers State and Nigeria is borne out of its commitment to check newborn deaths.
According to him, “the under 5 mortality has continued to reduce, the rate of increase of newborn deaths has somewhat. Therefore, for the state and country to achieve the SDGs, it needs to do things differently if the neonatal mortality rate is to reduce.
“It is in the light of this that UNICEF whole, heartedly supported the development of this plan. If the plan is fully implemented, it is believed that every newborn would not only survive, but would thrive and develop to its full potentials”, he said.
Dr Abe assured that “UNICEF will continue to support the Rivers State government with technical and financial assistance towards strengthened coordination of the heath sector, data generation for evidence and development, and use of frameworks for accelerating actions for impact to achieve results for women and children especially the newborn”.
Also speaking, the Director, Child Health, Federal Ministry of Health, Dr Bose Adeniran, said since the decision to commence the Newborn Action Plan in Nigeria was reached, Rivers State is the first to come up with US Plan among the 36 states of the federation.
The RIENAP is a plan to end preventable newborn deaths in Rivers State.