Accra has hosted a gathering of stakeholders to talk about measures to enhance maternal, newborn, and child health (MNCH).
A forum for stakeholders in the health sector to debate the advantages and disadvantages of a network put in place in 2017 to enhance MNCH quality was offered by the three-day event.
The countries of Ghana, Bangladesh, Côte d'Ivoire, Ethiopia, India, Malawi, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, the United Republic of Tanzania, and Uganda founded the network, dubbed the "Network for Enhancing Quality of Care for MNCH."
The World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF), the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), and additional partners also provided help.
The Minister of Health, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, stated during the opening ceremony of the "5th World Conference of the Network for Enhancing Quality of Care for MNCH" that although the network nations had not achieved their goal of lowering maternal mortality by half, substantial progress had been made.
He said that in Ghana, for instance, the percentage of births taking place at a health facility and the percentage of births attended by a competent provider both climbed from 54% to 79%, respectively.
According to him, the death rates for newborns and infants dropped from 29 to 25 and 50 to 37 per 1,000 live births, respectively.
"Despite this development, maternal mortality in Ghana, which is 319 per 100,000 live births, is concerning for mothers and children." "The majority of these fatalities may be avoided," he continued.
Broad-Based Health Insurance
Anshu Banerjee, the interim WHO Deputy Director General for Universal Health Coverage (UHC), emphasized the need for enhancing service quality and added that UHC was impossible to attain without high-quality primary healthcare.
He said it was crucial that the Ministry of Health incorporate the quality of care from the national health strategic plans into its operations and then put them into action throughout all networks at the local, district, regional, and national levels.
Dr. Francis Kasolo, the WHO Resident Representative in Ghana, said the international gathering was essential for them to reflect on the progress made and reevaluate how to deal with the new and unfinished agenda of quality of care in MNCH.
He stated, "As the WHO, we love the relationships, and we look forward to our continuous collaboration to create an expedited road towards attaining UHC with an emphasis on quality.
The implementing partners, including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF), UNICEF, UNFPA, and United States Agency for International Development (USAID), expressed their commitment to enhancing their cooperation in order to raise the standard of care given to expectant mothers, newborns, and children.
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