Giving Birth in Afghanistan

Oxfam took Alix Fazzina, a top photojournalist, to Badakhshan, Afghanistan, where she met and photographed the families behind the statistics and the doctors, midwives and traditional birth attendants trying to save women’s lives. In Afghanistan, a woman dies every 27 minutes due to pregnancy-related complications. There are 1,600 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births but in the remote mountainous province of Badakhshan the rate is 6,500 per 100,000 – the highest recorded rate of maternal mortality in the world. See the entire photo slideshow here.