WRA Nigeria is a part of the Nigeria National Self-Care Network established in October 2019 to coordinate self-care advocacy at the countrywide stage which will transform the healthcare system and place autonomy, power, and control in the hands of individuals. The Nigeria NSN leads a consultative procedure to outline a coordinated advocacy approach for self-care.
Thousands of girls and women in Niger State, Nigeria demanded that they get easy access to care and health services closer to their communities. Nothing embodies this request greater than self-care – specifically, equipping women and girls with the information and tools to manage their reproductive and maternal health in the comfort of their homes.
The WHO in 2019 released the Self-Care Guidelines for sexual, reproductive and maternal health, this Guideline was adapted by the Federal Ministry of Health. Women’s demands coincided with the Federal Ministry of Health’s renewed focus on self-care. Advocates brought women’s perspectives to key policy forums including stakeholder consultations on self-care and government meetings to develop a national guideline. In 2021, Nigeria became the first country worldwide to adopt and implement a national self-care guideline. As of 2022, nearly half the states in Nigeria have committed to implementing the guideline and expanding access to self-care – from building awareness of healthy behaviors to increasing availability of self-administered products for contraception, HIV testing, cervical cancer screening, and more.
Already, women are seeing changes in their communities. For example, health tips are reported more frequently in the media and translated into local dialects and self-injection for contraception is more widely available. And women are increasingly able to make informed decisions and take health into their own hands.