Updates

By: Madeline Taskier, Partnership Coordinator at Women Deliver  

Bordered by Chad, Cameroon, Niger, and the Gulf of Guinea, the West African country of Nigeria is the eighth most populous country in the world with a soaring maternal mortality rate.  As of 2008, the average maternal mortality rate was 840 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births and up to 1,549 deaths per 100,000 live births in rural areas. These statistics gave the Nigerian government a stern wakeup call: too many women were dying during pregnancy and childbirth with a weak healthcare workforce to support them. In 2009, the Nigerian National Primary Healthcare Development Agency (NPHDA) took action to expand women’s access to skilled health care workers in rural and suburban regions with the Midwives Services Scheme (MSS). Read more...

In the January 2011 issue of Impact Magazine, former president of Ireland and human rights activist Mary Robinson is interviewed by Heather Kitt, a medical student and Global Changemaker. Click through to read an excerpt of the interview.

By: Randy Hecht; originally posted on Healthymagination

In the United States, 24 in 100,000 women die in childbirth. But in developing countries, the number skyrockets: 1200 in 100,000 women in both Chad and Somalia; 1400 in 100,000 women in Afghanistan. Most of these deaths are preventable. Most of these mothers can be saved. Read more...