If pregnant women have a right to live, why do we let more women die in pregnancy or childbirth than in wars?
This is one of the questions I have asked myself working on the topic of dead mothers for several years.
Last year, as many women died as a result of pregnancy as they did in 1988 – more than 500,000. For each woman who dies – and that amounts to one each minute – 20 or 30 are injured or disable.
I find this very peculiar, when we know what could have saved them. When we know what it would cost. When we know the great payoffs in both the short and long term – not just in terms of the emotional well-being of children and families, but in hard economic costs. Then why isn’t it done?
In my opinion, one answer could be: ‘Because it is about women’. Women’s health and rights just don’t seem to count that much – whether within the family or within parliaments. Had it been men, who were sacrificed in such numbers, investments would probably have happened a long time ago.
Another answer could be: ‘Giving birth is not as important as other health issues’. Clean water, sanitation, malaria, HIV, polio. The list of health challenges is long. It can be difficult to prioritize when budgets are made. And public attention is more focused on some of the other issues.
A third answer could be: ‘Because it is about sex’. When addressing maternal health and women dying in childbirth, it is often necessary to talk about sexuality, fertility and reproductive health – and some people and policy makers might feel highly uncomfortable about that.
There can be other answers too. However if we agree that women’s rights are human rights, and that the human right to the highest attainable standard of health also applies to women, this is not so much about the answers, but about some basic questions that countries and communities, rich and poor, must answer:
Simple questions, and the answers should be simple too. Here’s one more: What’ stopping us?
About
Katja Iversen is a Media Specialist and Campaign Coordinator with the United Nations Population Fund, where she heads the communication effort on sexual and reproductive health and MDG 5. For more than 15 years she has worked in the field of communication and development: As Information and Web Officer with the UN Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome, as Head of Information in the Danish Family Planning Association, as cross cultural trainer of corporate executives, as coordinator of various information and fundraising campaigns and as director of KatComm a communication company focusing on strategic and political communications. Katja is Danish and holds a Master's Degree in Communications, a Bachelor's Degree in Public Administration and certificates in Management, International Politics and Cross Cultural Communications. When she is not working, you will find Katja diving down to the corals, at the dance floor or discussing the state of the world with friends.
Good post.
In Uganda maternal mortality is too frequent and quiet scary.
The problem is that we have is insuffient good health care services. The infrastructure is poor plus the personnel are limited especially in the rural areas.
Most of the women in rural areas have to walk long distances to the health centre and at times on getting there, there is a long que and may end up not being attended to.
Poverty is also another issue that increases maternal mortality. A number of women do not have well paying jobs so the have to depend on their husbands for money. The little money she gets from the husband is used for the children and the home essentials, this leaves very little to spend on herself.
Sandra
Most people don't think about it but if every man on the planet disappeared and there were left some frozen sperm, humanity could start over. But if every woman disappeared that is THE END! The world has it all backwards. When the world takes care of women, women take care of the world. Gender inequality is the moral scourge of the age. There is nothing to equal it in terms of human failings.
I am cofounder of 34 Million Friends of the UN Population Fund. I want the Cairo ICPD consensus to be fully implemented. I hear that filling the family planning gap would prevent 40% of maternal deaths. Gender inequality is the reason why ICPD is falling way behind. Women's lives both literally and figuratively are a low priority. What a tragedy!
Pregnant women have 100%rights to live. All we need is good government policies and better hospital services.I come from Uganda,but you find that the maternal death rate is on increase where as the Millennium development goal 5 says that Reduce by three quarters the maternal mortality by 2010.So my concern is why the development goals,have they not been implemented? I think focus was put more into education,HIV and other diseases and little to maternal health.
Women need to be sensitized more about their rights.I don't see any reason to why a woman in labor should be asked to buy gloves and other necessities in a government hospital.
It's a crisis of amazing proportions, yet its totally unseen. I work in Uttar Pradesh where we estimate around 25000 women dying each year (conservative estimates).
Each tragic death and near-miss that we record (and we have done a few hundred over the last ten years) in the remote rural areas of Uttar Pradesh is a story of apathetic, corrupt and unskilled health staff, of health centres in shambles, of poor families rushing around in desperation, struggling to prevent the death and sinking into deep debt as a result, of small children left motherless and a father devastated by this experience of total powerlessness.
The good news is that there is now a group of around 8000 women who are organized to demand their rights to quality health-care services, who are monitoring their entitlements and engaging in dialogue with health officials and elected leaders. Admittedly its a drop in the ocean. But that's what keeps us going....
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Wednesday 7th October, 2009, 12:46am
Loved the post.
We seemed to have a lot of solutions and answers to many global problems...there is a huge disconnect between knowing and doing as we are all aware.
I wonder if the reaction to some of the statistics mentioned in the post about maternal rights in South Asia would have the same response if it was the situation in Canada for example?
We have the data, knowledge, and tools....are we lacking support and finances perhaps? And who do we go to for resources, perhaps we need to review our models for resource mobilization and think outside of the box?
Tanya