How faith leader’s involvement promote child, family health

Faith leaders have said they have a key role to play in ensuring the success of child and family health and other public health programmes in the country.  They stated this during a workshop organized by the Development Research and Projects Centre (dRPC) a non-governmental organization for over 40 Muslim opinion leaders in Abuja.  The […]

Faith leaders have said they have a key role to play in ensuring the success of child and family health and other public health programmes in the country.
 They stated this during a workshop organized by the Development Research and Projects Centre (dRPC) a non-governmental organization for over 40 Muslim opinion leaders in Abuja.
 The meeting was convened under the auspices of the Gates funded Partnership for Advocacy in Child and Family Health (PACFaH) project  in order to support Federation of Muslim Women’s Association  of Nigeria, FOMWAN as a leading PACFaH partner.
They also commended the Development Research and Projects Centre for engaging traditional and religious leaders in public health programmes for over twenty years , saying it has helped them with mobilization of the populace, and enlightened them on controversial health issues .
 Speaking separately, the Muslim scholars took turns to share experiences about how their views on polio, family planning, routine immunization changed after participating in dRPC projects like the one on Leadership Development for Traditional and Religious Leaders in reproductive health project (LDT) funded by USAID Nigeria and the Saving Lives at Birth (SL@B).
 The scholars comprised traditional rulers, Friday mosque Imams from Bauchi State, Imams from Local Government Areas in Katsina state and from city mosques in Sokoto and Niger State .
“I preached against polio, routine immunization and family planning, I was even called to the Shehu’s Palace but I was not convinced.But after I got back from the dRPC study tour to Al-Hazar in Egypt, I changed”, said a female scholar from Sokoto State who was supported to attend study tours in Mali and Egypt under USAID/LDT project.
The National Vice President, FOMWAN, Hajiya Farida Sada Yusuf, said: “Faith leaders play an important role in healthcare, especially in rural areas, where people hold on strongly to wrong religious and harmful traditional beliefs.”
 The scholars also promised to  be committed to strengthening networks and to continue supporting child and family health as health advocates and champions for social mobilization .
 The District Head of Gagi, Sokoto, State Alhaji Sani  Umar  Jabbi, said traditional leaders needed to enlighten their people on controversial health issues to change their norms and perceptions.
 The programme tagged “The role of Faith Leaders in Child and Family Health”, focused on the models of faith leaders’ involvement in advocacy, awareness creation and social mobilisation programmes for child and family health.