It is a statistic which would make any citizen hang his head in shame and pain. According to a recently released Maternal Mortality report, compiled by the World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, UNFPA and the World Bank, India accounts for the highest female death rates during childbirth.
Yes more women die in India during childbirth than anywhere else in the world, even the poorest of African countries have better maternity healthcare facilities than India. During 2005, 5.36 lakh women died during pregnancy or immediately after childbirth across the world. Of the 5.36 lakh, 1.17 lakh were from India. Our healthcare systems can only boast of being better than countries like Nigeria (59,000), Congo (32,000) and Afghanistan (26,000), which are torn by civil violence, wars and famine. But a progressive economy, IT-superpower and India leading the list, it is shameful. India, along with 10 other countries, accounted for almost 65% of global maternal deaths in 2005.
The maternal mortality ratio (MMR) in India is 450 deaths per 100,000 live births. In comparison, India’s neighbors are better off Bangladesh reported 21,000 deaths with an MMR of 570, Pakistan recorded 15,000 deaths with MMR of 320, China had 7,800 deaths with MMR of 45 and Nepal 6,500 deaths with MMR of 830 during the same period. Sri Lanka recorded the least with only 190 deaths with an MMR of 58.
Rampant poverty, hunger, and untreated diseases were the three main reasons for 99 percent of the deaths. Moreover sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia accounted for 86 percent of the world’s maternal deaths in 2005.
The Maternal Mortality report was published in the Lancet on October 12 and revealed another shocking detail that the decline in global MMR is too slow to meet Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 5, which aims to reduce the number of women who die in pregnancy and childbirth by three-quarters by 2015.
Looking at the Indian scenario, one of the primary reasons for this dangerously high maternal death rate is due to lack of quality healthcare and access to medical care. There is usually no improvement in the care and attention that women get even during pregnancy. According to the NFHS-III report released by the ministry of health and family welfare, government of India, one in four women (23%), who gave birth during the past eight years, received no antenatal care at all. The percentage of women who did not receive any antenatal care varied from 1 percent in Kerala and Tamil Nadu to 40 percent in Jharkhand, Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland to 66 percent in Bihar.
While the pre-natal and antenatal care is in its abysmally low standards. The birthing process is itself a big grey area in India. Rural Indian which records highest birth rates still doesn’t have adequate number of maternity homes. Most babies are delivered at home, nearly 60 percent of all births are home births with over 37 percent deliveries performed by traditional birth attendants and 16 percent by relatives and no doctor or nurse present.
One heartening event is that this Maternal Mortality Report comes at the right time, a few days prior to the convention of world leaders at London where over 1,500 world leaders are expected to converge to attend ‘Women Deliver’, a global conference focused on strengthening healthcare systems to stem the increasing MMR. The conference scheduled to be held from October 18-20, will focus on creating political will and strengthening health systems to prevent the death of one woman every minute of every day during pregnancy or childbirth.
