The Shame(s) of the nation…musings on maternal death rates in the U.S.

You might recognize the first part of my title. It’s borrowed from a phenomenal book written by long-time educator, writer and activist Jonathan Kozol.

In it, he blows the whistle on the abysmal state of education in cities throughout the U.S. It’s an issue that’s been prevalent for more than two decades. However, most of us look the other way because it doesn’t affect us.

 The same title could be used to describe the horror of maternal death rates in the U.S. in recent years. Today, in our country, more than two women will die of pregnancy-related causes. Will we look the other way as well? Does it not affect us?

Maternal mortality is a serious issue. More serious than we like to think. The ratio has doubled from “6.6 deaths per 100,000 births in 1987 to 13.3 deaths per 100,000 births in 2006”. Nonetheless, as extreme as those rates are, they could very well be much higher because there are no federal requirements to report these outcomes. Guidelines for reporting maternal deaths lie at the state and local levels.

 So… since the feds don’t require reporting these deaths as they should be, private citizens, NGOs, and birth activists around the country have been forced to take it upon themselves to blow the whistle on this topic.

According to a recent report by ABC news, maternal death rates in the U.S. are the same as they were in the seventies. How can we regress instead of progress in terms of maternal health and care? At a time in which labor inductions, usage of epidural anesthesia, and surgical births are at an all-time high, so are maternal deaths in this country. There seems to be a correlation between the two.

 A recent report published by Amnesty International titled “Deadly Delivery”, states that “approximately half of the pregnancy-related deaths in the U.S. are preventable, the result of systemic failures, including barriers to accessing care; inadequate, neglectful or discriminatory care; and overuse of risky interventions like inducing labor and delivering via cesarean section”.

 The report clearly supports my statement in the paragraph above. It also calls us to question the validity of more interventionist approaches to prenatal care.

Internationally renowned midwife, writer, and birth activist Ina May Gaskin has been speaking on this issue for two decades now.  She spearheaded “The safe motherhood quilt project” in 1982. The project is a national initiative developed to bring awareness to maternal deaths in the U.S., an issue that is grossly underreported.

 So, if Gaskin has been blowing the whistle since 1982, why have federal authorities not taken purposeful actions to prevent, report, and address this issue?

Model, film director, and activist Christy Turlington Burns seeks some answers in her documentary “No Woman, No Cry”. She captures the stories of at-risk pregnant women in Tanzania, Bangladesh, Guatemala and the United States. According to her website, www.everymothercounts.org , the maternal mortality rate in the U.S. is 1 in 4,800. If these figures are not appalling enough to make us take a stand on the issue, I don’t know what will.

 Steps we can take to contribute to improvements in maternity care that will bring the maternal mortality rate down in our communities are the following:

• Tweet your senator and support the health reform to ensure all mothers have access to adequate prenatal care.
• Become a skilled birth attendant and support the women in your community. Research shows that having a midwife or doula attended birth decreases the need for an unnecessary cesarean section by 50%.
• Get involved in your local ICAN chapter.
• Ask questions, demand evidence-based information for every possible intervention.
• Choose your prenatal care provider wisely.

 Maternal mortality affects all of us. Don’t wait until you have to bury someone you know to take a stand against it. It is our moral responsibility to each other.

~MRM

~ by mamamia713 on 11/17/2010.