At just 16, Zuhara (not her real name) was forced to drop out of school in May 2025 after becoming pregnant—ending her dreams of taking the West African Senior School Certificate Examination alongside her classmates.
Zuhara lives in Shere, a remote village about 13 kilometers from the nearest urban center. In her community, access to healthcare is scarce, and open conversations about sex, menstruation, and contraception are almost nonexistent.
Her story reflects a widespread challenge faced by many young girls in rural Nigeria: teenage pregnancy fueled by a lack of information, limited access to reproductive healthcare, poverty, and cultural taboos. Without proper intervention, such early pregnancies often derail girls’ education, expose them to health risks, and trap families in cycles of poverty.
Experts say that preventing teenage pregnancy requires a holistic approach that includes open dialogue, accurate reproductive health education, and accessible services. However, in rural areas like Shere, where even the most basic health services are limited, community engagement becomes crucial.
One key strategy is effective budgeting and investment in girls’ education and community healthcare. By allocating resources to create safe spaces where young people can learn about their bodies, rights, and choices, communities can help protect girls like Zuhara from preventable life-altering situations.
Community leaders, parents, schools, and government agencies must also collaborate to break the silence around sexual health education. Empowering girls with knowledge, ensuring access to contraceptives, and addressing socio-economic factors that contribute to early marriage and childbearing are all part of the solution.
Zuhara said she walked nearly 50km to school and travelled long distances to get basic medication.
“There are no youth-friendly clinics, no female doctors, and no spaces where I can ask questions. My pregnancy was unplanned and entirely preventable,” she said.
Zuhara’s story mirrors the lives of many Nigerian female adolescents.
In a country with one of the highest adolescent fertility rates in the world – 117 births per 1,000 girls aged 15 years to 19 years, adolescents like Zuhara remain trapped in cycles of silence, stigma and lost potential.
This crisis formed the heart of the recent National Policy Dialogue on Improving Adolescent Access to Quality Sexual and Reproductive Health Services convened in Abuja by Nigeria Health Watch and partners.
With the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals deadline approaching and donor support shrinking, the desire of stakeholders is that Nigeria should do its best to adequately fund girls reproductive health and rights services.
Nigeria’s commitments under the FP2030 family planning initiative are ambitious, with stakeholders hoping earnestly for its effective delivery.
A recent Integrated Community Listening Survey conducted in six states by Nigeria Health Watch revealed that 50 per cent of respondents, especially those aged 18 years to 34 years, still struggle to access Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR) services.
“Despite decades of investments, we are still battling low awareness, long distances to health centres, stigma and weak service delivery,” said Ms Anwuli Nwankwo, Knowledge Management Lead at Nigeria Health Watch.
Nwankwo said that cultural norms and misinformation remained major barriers to accessing the services.
“While primary healthcare centres remain the first point of contact for most people, many of these facilities are poorly equipped to deliver comprehensive SRHR services.
“In many states, there are no budget lines, and, therefore, no services.
“While adolescent girls are paying the price in lost opportunities, state governments are being called to action to fund and own their reproductive health programmes,” she said.
Dr Tomi Coker, Commissioner for Health, Ogun, said that the state got 0.04 dollars per capita in donor funding.
Coker said in spite of that situation, Ogun had remained committed to providing the services, funding its MAMI project, procuring essential medicines, and sustaining supply chains through state resources.
According to her, the success was made possible by a co-funding model introduced by The Challenge Initiative (TCI), which shifts responsibility from donors to governments overtime.
“We cannot keep waiting for handouts. This is about national sovereignty,” she said.
In Kano State, innovation is driving change, according to Mr Aminu Bashir, Permanent Secretary, Kano State Ministry of Health.
Bashir said that the state had established the Kano Health Trust Fund, which he described as the first of its kind in Nigeria.
Bashir added that the fund pooled resources from all 44 local government areas of the state and the state’s internally-generated revenue, with a dedicated percentage allocated to family planning.
“For the first time, Kano State earmarked ₦500 million in its budget solely for family planning,” he said.
He said that the commitment was supported through a tripartite arrangement involving the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Lafiya Project and the Kano State Government, enabling sustained funding for SRHR interventions.
For Malam Talle Ghali Dambazau, an Assistant Director of Education working on adolescents and reproductive health in Nigeria’s education sector, state-level implementation of the Family Life and HIV Education (FLHE) curriculum is key.
Dambazau called for deeper collaboration between national and subnational governments to ensure that trained teachers and linked health services would reach young people effectively.
He noted that in 2023, the Federal Ministry of Health and the Federal Ministry of Education jointly committed to a national framework for youths’ well-being, which aimed to integrate school-based education with health services, psychosocial support and hygiene interventions.
Prof. Muhammad Ali Pate, Nigeria’s Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, emphasised that family planning was not just a health issue but also a strategic lever for economic growth, gender equality, and national resilience.
Pate reaffirmed the ministry’s commitment to delivering integrated, rights-based SRHR services, highlighting strategic priorities such as expanding youth-friendly health services, deploying digital platforms and mobile clinics, and strengthening supply chains through the Procurement and Value Chain Advisory Council.
He also highlighted enhancement of data systems via DHIS2 to enable real-time disaggregated decision-making.
In all these, some stakeholders said that implementation across states remained patchy, arguing that with Nigeria’s education system, curriculum delivery in FLHE had often been innconsistent and poor for adolescent females in remote communities.
They emphasised the role of technology in the delivery of services.
Dr Fatima Bunza, Country Director of Tiko Nigeria, recommended a hybrid solution using smartphone-based services and eco-cards distributed by trained mobilisers.
“Low-tech isn’t a fallback. It is a core part of our model. We are reaching girls others cannot,” Bunza said.
Also in an efforts to provide solutions, Lola AI, a WhatsApp-based tool developed by Healthtracka, is providing confidential SRHR information to female adolescents.
“Lola speaks to girls kindly in their language on a platform they use daily,” said Ms Testimony Adeyemi, Marketing Lead of Lola AI.
Ms Mashishi Mokgadi, Africa Access Lead at Organon, shared the story of one a 15-year-old Lucy, who became pregnant due to lack of contraceptives, dropped out of school, and was married off.
“Lucy’s story is a national economic loss. It touches every Sustainable Development Goal. We cannot keep watering the plants while the house is burning,” Mokgadi said.
She gave the assurance that Organon had committed to preventing 120 million unintended pregnancies by 2030.
She said that the organisation was already over halfway to achieving the goal.
She called on African governments to create specific budget lines for family planning, eliminate legal barriers that restricted adolescent access to services and begin to frame health budgets as an investment rather than a cost.
Ms Margaret Bolaji, Youth Partnerships Officer at FP2030, advocated youth-led accountability mechanisms and highlighted tools such as the “Lemon” STI self-testing kits for girls.
Ms Peace Umanah of IYAFP said, “Stop being vague. Funders are moved by authenticity. We must speak from our lived experience.”
Analysts urge intensified efforts to prevent adolescents from dying in childbirth or getting stuck in poverty due to preventable pregnancies, saying that adolescents such as Zahara should be seen, heard and empowered.
They strongly believe that political will and financial commitment are needed to achieve the aims, saying that funding adolescent SRHR is a long-term investment in Nigeria’s future.
They are hopeful that Nigeria will do more to increase and sustain investments in its female adolescents in an effort to achieve Sustainable Development Goals and build a bright future for them and the country at large.
