Nigeria recorded notable progress in maternal health services, family planning uptake, and antenatal care utilization in 2025, according to the 2025 State of Health of the Nation Report released on Sunday in Abuja.
The report, produced under the National Health Act 2014, highlighted improvements in several maternal health indicators but warned that major gaps remained in postnatal care, cancer screening, and nationwide access to skilled birth attendants.
Nigeria’s family planning services expanded steadily in 2025, with approximately 80,000 women newly accepting modern contraceptive methods each quarter. This represented an overall 45% increase in uptake nationwide during the year.
The report indicated that modern contraceptive prevalence among married women stood at 15%, while 49.6% of women now had their family planning needs satisfied by modern methods—up from 42% in 2018.
Antenatal care attendance improved markedly, with first visits consistently exceeding 1.8 million. The number of women completing the recommended four visits rose from 760,000 in early 2024 to more than one million by 2025.
However, about 60% of pregnant women still began antenatal care after 20 weeks of pregnancy, underscoring persistent delays in accessing maternal health services across many communities nationwide, the report noted.
Deliveries attended by skilled birth attendants increased sharply, rising from 640,000 in 2024 to 900,000 in 2025. This reflected improved delivery practices, though 7% of facility births still lacked skilled personnel.
Maternal deaths recorded in health facilities declined from 161 in the first quarter to 108 in the fourth quarter of 2025, marking roughly a 25% drop compared with 2024 levels.
Postnatal care remained a major gap, with only 43% of women receiving checks within two days after delivery—slightly higher than the 42% recorded in 2018 nationwide, the report stated.
The report also highlighted wider health risks facing women, including anaemia affecting 47%, persistently low cancer screening rates, gaps in hepatitis awareness, and growing nutrition concerns, with about 30% of women overweight or obese.
