Health is essential to every human being across the world. A healthy population brims a healthy economy. Access to good and quality health care is the right of all range of people in the country. As health is for a range of people, it seems the Nigeria health has not prioritized inclusive healthcare system, especially sexual reproductive health of women and girls with disabilities. There have been no concrete plans which accommodate women and girls living with disabilities in sexual reproductive health package at different levels of governments in Nigeria. 

This had prevented many women, girls with disabilities from getting adequate sexual reproductive health(SRH) attention. The followings are the foundations as well as outcomes of such neglect.

Stigmatization and discrimination: Stigmatization and discrimination are attitudinal derogations which women and girls with disabilities are daily facing in their bid to benefit from quality and accessible sexual reproductive  healthcare, if that exist in the first instance.

The pivotal agents of these attitudinal derogations are the health workers who sometime indirectly abuse patients who have disabilities. Stigmatization and discrimination by health workers affect patients mentally. This often lead to depression or other mental-related issues. A visually-impaired patient once shared how she was once discriminated against, tactically insulted by a health worker. Since she  had decided not to go to public hospital again

Health Investment deficit: Inadequate financing of the health sector reflects in lack of assistive devices, accessible technology that can aid women and girls with disabilities sexual reproductive health diagnosis and management. 2023 Nigeria ‘budget only enjoys 5.75% of the total budget. Meanwhile African Leaders under the Abuja Declaration had advocated for a base of at least 15% of the annual spending to the sector.

Communication barriers: As already identified in a previous post, individuals with hearing. speech and visual impairments continued to be left behind. There is shortage of social health social workers trained in sign language etc who can help in many public and private hospitals

Long waiting time; Long waiting time is a common factor for majority of people looking for health care in public health institutions. For women with disabilities, sitting down for long or waiting for a whole day sometime can really be a burden. A great solution here can be priority in consultation for women and girls with disabilities  so as to reduce this discomfort

Transportation and distance: with the increase in cost of living standard that is not backed up with commensurate purchasing power for many, especially persons with disabilities, many of whom are not gainfully employed; the challenge becomes compounded. Yes, there are Primary health Care centres, but some are not fully equipped to care for women and girls with disabilities ‘sexual reproductive health needs.

Limited PWD sexual and reproductive health materials: For women without disabilities, there are couples of materials here and there they can access, read to be informed of what sexual and reproductive health challenges and opportunities can present to them. But with women and girls with disabilities, not much materials are available out there when compared with women without disabilities