Every Day

  • Over 800 women die from preventable causes related to pregnancy and childbirth.
  • Every minute, 2 women dies from pregnancy complications.
  •  2 million mothers watch their babies die within 24 hours of birth.
  • But the good news is, these deaths are preventable. In fact, 98% of maternal deaths are preventable.
  • If low-cost, medical interventions are provided to infants and pregnant women, 3 million babies can be saved each year.

United States spends more money per capita for maternity care than any other country in the world yet:

  • Highest overall mortality rate in developed countries!
  • While maternal death rates in other nations are falling by 44%, they’re rising in the U.S. MMR in the U.S. increased from 17 deaths per 100,000 live births in 1990 to 26 deaths in 2015.
  • More women die of childbirth-related causes in the US than they do in Iran (20.8), Lebanon (15.3), Turkey (15.8), Puerto Rico (15.1), China (17.7), and many more.
  • Black mothers, are three times more likely to die or suffer serious illness from pregnancy-related causes than white women, with at least 40 deaths per 100,000 live births on average, compared to 14 for white mothers. Native-American mothers are nearly twice as likely to die as their white peers.

For a nation that is among the top 10 wealthiest in the world, these statistics are unacceptable. There are solutions – Some of them are even straightforward:

  • We know where it occurs
  • We know who are the most affected
  • We know the causes
  • We know how to tackle them and prevent complications and deaths.

As I see it, the one remaining question here is: Why we still rather treat maternal health issues as a private tragedy and pregnancy as a disease rather than as a public health catastrophe?

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