The National Population Commission, NPC, has announced plans to commence data collection for the 2019 Verbal and Social Autopsy Survey, VASA, across twenty-nine communities in Anambra State.
The Commission decried the prevalence of under five mortality in the country with an average of one hundred and thirty-two deaths per one thousand births.
Speaking at a press briefing in Awka, the Acting Chairman of the Commission, Mrs. Bimbola Salu-Hundeyin, explained that the survey would seek to gather data to determine the cause and contributory factors to deaths in children aged zero to five years.
The planned policy is a follow up to last year’s Demographic Health Survey and seeks to determine the causes and contributory factors to the number of deaths in children under five given that has given the country a high infant mortality rate.
According to the Acting Chairman who spoke through the Anambra State Commissioner of the Commission, Mr. Chidi Ezeoke, the Nigerian Demographic Health survey conducted by the NPC in 2018, had a total number of three thousand, two hundred and fifteen under five mortality recorded cases, with the northern Nigeria region having the highest number totaling about two thousand, six hundred and one deaths. Mrs. Salu-Hundeyin, noted that the Commission found the development very disturbing and is set to conduct yet another survey to determine the causes of deaths in children within the identified age range.
She called for more support from all departments of government, traditional rulers and religious leaders for the success of the exercise and added that the exercise will start from tenth to nineteenth of this month, to ensure that the commission generates accurate and credible data for effective planning and sustainable health development in Nigeria.
The Chairman further noted that the outcome of the survey would provide national and zonal estimates of the major causes of under-investment mortality in Nigeria from 2013 down to 2018.
The event had in attendance representatives of the local government councils, president generals of various communities in the state and other stakeholders among others.
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