Dr Muhammad Pate, Minister of State for Health, said this in Abuja during the national maternal, newborn, child health commodities availability conference.
``We have set an ambitious goal of saving one million lives through the deployment of cost effective interventions.
``The scaling up of access to essential maternal, newborn, child health commodities and improving logistics and supply chain systems in the country are key drivers for the successful implementation of saving one million live programme.”
Pate said for the MNCH component, a new approach had been developed through the SURE-P MCH programme to include supply and demand side interventions.
He said the supply intervention comprised a full complement of skilled health workers, essential maternal and child health commodities, equipment and refurbishment of facilities.
On the demand side, Conditional Cash Transfers (CCT) have been introduced through the programme by using cash incentive to encourage the use of antenatal care, skilled birth delivery, post-natal and family planning services at the primary health care facilities.
Pate said MCH interventions had the potential to save up to 662,900 lives, of which were 16.800 maternal lives, 180,800 neonatal lives, 465, 300 post neonatal and child lives by 2015.
He said for the logistics and supply chain component, a total of up to 4,300 facilities across the country would be reached in the pilot phase of the programme.
Pate said the government was determined to identify the root causes of commodity stock outs and better understand consumption patterns, quantities of commodities required and funding arrangement.
The minister said in addition to the annual commitment of three million dollars for the procurement of reproductive health commodities, additional 8.35 million had been added for the next four years.
In her speech, Mrs Victoria Akyeampong, UNFPA Representative, said the saving one million lives initiative contributed to the UN Secretary General’s global strategy for women and children’s health.
Akyeampong said the global strategy highlighted the need to address inequities experienced by women and children around the world in accessing quality health services.
She said through the strategy, the UN Secretary General advocated strongly for universal access to basic health care for all women and children.
``At the country level, we are pleased to note that the Nigerian home-grown saving one million lives initiative had in itself identified equitable availability of essential life-saving medicines at service delivery points as one of the critical enablers to accelerating improvement in health outcomes.”
Also speaking, Prof. Oladapo Ladipo, President, Association for Reproductive and Family Health (ARFH) urged the government to address the procurement mechanism in the country.
Ladipo called for more commitment from the federal, state and local governments and also advocated for the strengthening of all the primary health care by providing enough health care workers, equipping the facilities among others.
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