Only 2.1 per cent of married women in Bauchi State are using a modern method of contraceptive, which is lower than the national rate of 10 per cent.
 
This was disclosed yesterday by the Country Director of Health Policy Plus, with funding from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Mr. Onoriode Ezire, who noted that because of the low practice of contraceptive in the state, the population of Bauchi is likely to reach 26 million by 2050 as against the present population of about five million.
 

NOT everyone thinks birth control is a blessing. Boko Haram, a jihadist group that terrorises north-eastern Nigeria, deems artificial contraception to be a product of infidel learning, and therefore forbidden. Its ideologues also believe that females should avoid school, marry early (sometimes while still children) and have lots of babies. In the dwindling areas the jihadists control, women have no choice.
 

The Federal Government’s advocacy on the use of contraceptive among sexually active women in Nigeria for the prevention of unwanted pregnancy and abortion is beginning to yield positive results as more women are recorded to be embracing the method.
 
Compiled data from the 2015 report of the National Bureau of Statistics, NBS, on health shows that contraceptive use among sexually active women of child bearing age increased by seven per cent compared to 2014.