It Was Twenty
Years Ago
This Month…
NEW YORK,
February
13, 2007 – The
pioneering
Safe
Motherhood
Initiative
(SMI)
is 20
years
old this
month.
The global
movement
of activists,
researchers,
health
experts,
development
professionals
and policy-makers
began
at a
1987
conference
in Nairobi,
Kenya,
with
the goal
of cutting
maternal
deaths
worldwide
in half
by 2000.
“We’re still working on it,” said Jill Sheffield, the SMI
sparkplug who is founder and president of Family Care International, which
served as SMI secretariat from 1987 through 2004. “Now at least we
know what to do to save women’s lives.”
The Initiative
sent researchers
into the
field worldwide
and generated
scores of
studies,
reports,
publications,
fact sheets,
and national
and regional
conferences.
It raised
awareness
about safe
motherhood,
defined goals
and priorities
for action,
mobilized
resources
and shared
information.
But one woman
still dies
every minute
somewhere
from complications
of pregnancy
and childbirth – more
than 530,000
needless
deaths per
year. Thoraya
Ahmed Obaid,
executive
director
of UNFPA, United
Nations Population
Fund, called
the toll “unacceptable” and
said the
SMI’s
20th anniversary “should
serve as
a loud wake-up
call” for
government
and public
action. “No
woman should
die giving
life,” she
said.
Sheffield
agreed, adding
that the
deaths result
from insufficient
investment
in the sexual
and reproductive
health needs
of girls
and women,
and donors
and governments
that lack
political
will to take
the necessary
action.
To
try to change
that, Sheffield
has enlisted
other activists,
global health
organizations
and non-governmental
groups to
craft a common
agenda for
action at
an international
conference
in London
next fall.
The October
18-20 gathering,
called WOMEN
DELIVER,
will seek
to put the
world spotlight
on safe motherhood
by uniting
the various
communities
whose goals
depend on
women’s
advancement:
international
development
and poverty
reduction,
slowing population
growth, promoting
women’s
equality,
children’s
well-being,
and global
health, and
combating
HIV/AIDS.
The conference
by-line is ‘Invest
In Women – It
Pays!'
“Women’s right to safe pregnancy and motherhood is the single
factor common to all their goals,” Sheffield said. “It’s
time to drive the point home again.” |
