Dr Ashiru Abubakar is a MamaYe hero who revived a maternity centre's blood bank. He needed to first use himself as an example so as to convince other people to donate blood to save lives of mothers and babies.
During his internship in 2010 at Murtala Muhammad Specialist Hospital, Kano, Ashiru Abubakar became disturbed by the high rate of women dying in the process of giving birth. Most of the deaths were due to severe bleeding, and provisions to meet the demand to replace lost blood were highly inadequate.Ashiru decided that he needed to do something to help reduce maternal deaths in his state. He then organised and chaired a blood donation campaign with the aim of improving the capacity and efficiency of the hospital’s maternity blood bank. The campaign generated about 200 pints of blood.Before the campaign, Ashiru had personally donated a total of 15 pints of blood just to lead by example, and thus helped dispel some of the fears and misconceptions in the region about blood donation.Ashiru said ‘the alarming rate of maternal mortality and subsequent physical, social and psychological burden it causes to families ignited my passion to add to efforts that will save the lives of these women’.Ashiru graduated with a degree in Medicine from the Bayero University, Kano, and joined the Maternal Health Young Champions program for an opportunity to contribute to the development of the health situation in his community.In 2012, Ashiru was one of the best three out of up to 200 applicants for Young Champions of Maternal Health award in Arusha, Tanzania.When MamaYe Nigeria launched on February 19 2013, Dr Ashiru was recognised with an award for his efforts in saving lives of mothers and babies by donating blood and by organizing blood donation campaign that pulled in other voluntary donors.Ashiru's passion on blood donation continues as he has plans to partner with MamaYe Nigeria to recruit more voluntary blood donors to help save lives of mothers and babies.Read about Phoebe, another MamaYe voluntary blood donation heroine who goes beyond duty and donates blood to save lives of mothers and babies.