Most deaths go undocumented as Nigeria records 5m births yearly

The National Population Commission, NPC, has lamented that although Nigeria records about five million births yearly, most deaths are not documented.

A Federal Commissioner of the NPC, Clifford Zira, who stated this at an event in Yola, added that even births are not registered in many cases.

He said birth registration coverage is currently about 57 per cent nationwide, while death documentation is below 20 per cent.

He said the poor registration of births and deaths calls for sustained routine registration of births and deaths by relevant authorities.

Zira announced the commencement of digital registration of both births and deaths across Adamawa State by the NPC under the Electronic Civil Registration and Vital Statistics system.

The NPC Commissioner said the exercise would strengthen civil registration and improve the generation of statistics to guide public policy and resource allocation.

He explained that the digital registration system became operational across the 21 LGAs of Adamawa State at the beginning of this month, adding that the initiative builds on the launch of the E-CRVS system and the inauguration of the National Coordination Committee on Civil Registration and Vital Statistics by President Bola Tinubu.

According to him, to bridge the gap, the NPC has established 4,011 functional registration centres across the 774 LGAs of the country.

In a remark, NPC State Director, Jummai Hassan, who expressed regret over the low level of death registration in Adamawa State, described the digital registration initiative as one of the most transformative reforms in the history of civil registration in Nigeria.