As Nigeria confronts persistent challenges in women’s health from soaring maternal mortality to stark inequalities in reproductive care, the senior special assistant on women’s health, Dr Adanna Steinacker, has said they would tackle the disparities.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with LEADERSHIP, Dr. Steinacker said the establishment of her office marked a deliberate move by the federal government to tackle deep-seated gender disparities in healthcare and reframe women’s health as a national development priority.
“Nigeria is facing a women’s health crisis, one that is urgent, avoidable, and deeply systemic,” she said, citing maternal mortality, underinvestment, and fragmented governance as key gaps her office was set up to address.
With maternal deaths estimated at 512 per 100,000 live births, Dr. Steinacker noted that issues such as postpartum haemorrhage, lack of skilled birth attendants, and inadequate antenatal access continue to cost lives. “Too many women are still dying from preventable causes,” she said.
To reverse the trend, her office has adopted a five-pillar national strategy focused on media and communications, health education, policy advocacy, digital innovation, and community empowerment.
These strategies are interconnected and aligned with federal reform agendas.
“We see media not just as a platform, but a catalyst for social impact. We’re shifting mindsets, elevating community solutions, and putting women’s health squarely in the public consciousness,” she said.
On the policy front, Dr. Steinacker highlighted the ongoing push for a six-month paid maternity leave policy, a campaign vigorously championed by the Nigerian Governors’ Wives Forum and now supported at the federal level. Her office also engages ministries to integrate breastfeeding support and workplace childcare into national health and labour frameworks.
She said innovation plays a critical role in reaching the most underserved. Her office is developing AI-powered, voice-based health education tools in multiple Nigerian languages to reach rural women with life-saving information without needing smartphones or internet access.
“Digital platforms must respect our people’s realities,” she explained, adding that her team is also working on community-based microfinance models to fund maternal care, inspired by global social enterprise models.
On the ground, she praised grassroots innovations such as WhatsApp-based referral systems run by traditional birth attendants and local savings groups now adapted to pool health insurance for emergency care. “This works because they are built on trust,” she said.
Strategic partnerships have also been central to her impact so far. Dr Steinacker pointed to her collaborations with the Nigeria Governors’ Spouses Forum and the Nigeria Governors’ Forum, aligning political advocacy with systemic financing. “We are laying the foundation for a future where no woman is left behind, regardless of income or location.”
Asked about the personal drive behind her work, she traced it back to her childhood, when she watched her grandmother suffer a fatal illness. That early experience, combined with years of witnessing systemic neglect in her medical practice, has continued to fuel her passion.
“My grandmother’s suffering lit a fire in me, and it’s never gone out,” she said.
Looking ahead, Dr Steinacker called for a national conversation around the economic cost of ignoring women’s health. “Women’s health is national wealth,” she said. “It’s not just lives lost, it’s productivity, growth, and the well-being of future generations at stake.”
When asked what legacy she hopes her office will leave, her response was clear: “I hope women will say, this was the moment we became visible. This office wasn’t just symbolic; it was systemic.”
With growing momentum and the weight of the Presidency behind her, Dr Adanna Steinacker may be steering one of the most significant transformations in Nigeria’s health history, where women’s lives, voices, and futures are finally brought to the centre.
