The Minister of Health, Prof. Isaac Adewole, has advised Nigerian couples to know their Rhesus factor before making babies so as to save them the agony of having miscarriages and stillbirths.
Adewole, who was represented by the Chief Medical Director of the Lagos University Teaching Hospital, Prof. Chris Bode, at a symposium organised by Rhesus Solution Initiative at the Sickle Cell Foundation Centre in Idi-Araba, Lagos on Wednesday, urged the National Assembly to enact laws that would compel unmarried couples to find out about their Rhesus factors before getting married.
He said, “It will be very simple if we make a law that says every man and woman who wants to make a baby should know their blood group. If a woman is Rhesus-negative and the husband happens to be positive, that woman will be told that whenever she is having her babies, she should take the Rhogam injection. That way, their babies will not die from this easily preventable disease.”
When the pregnant woman is Rhesus-negative, there is the possibility that the blood in the foetus might be the blood of her Rhesus positive husband. So, complications arise before or after delivery and the baby is lost,