Child spacing and child mortality among Nigerian Igbos

Until recently, a birth interval of at least two years was the norm in the Nigerian Igbo culture, a practice necessary for infant health and survival. A study of antenatal patients of the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital, Enugu, Nigeria, shows that this cultural pattern has been disrupted by Westernization, urbanization and consumerism. The patients studied had an average of four pregnancies in five years. Roughly half of those conceived did not survive: 41% of the patients reported having lost at least one child. Modern family planning methods are urged as replacements for the abandoned traditional methods of child spacing.