Mother and child health in Africa: the role of health education.

Research and practical experience clearly indicate that most mother and child health problems in Africa are preventable. Most are associated with poor personal hygiene and environmental sanitation, ignorance, poverty, and inadequacy or nonutilization of available health services. Improved health planning can either alleviate or totally abolish many of these problems. Health education is an integral part of mother and child health and other medical care programs. Because the reaction of the individual to medical intervention is largely determined by the sociocultural and community environment, health education should not be directed towards the health-deficient target population alone, but towards the community as a whole.