Maternal Health Task Force
The Maternal Health Task Force strives to create a strong, well-informed and collaborative community of individuals focused on ending preventable maternal mortality and morbidity worldwide.
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Blog
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A Different Approach to Improving Childbirth
By Neel Shah, Associate Faculty at the Ariadne Labs for Health Systems Innovation When it comes to childbirth, the United States of America seems to combine the problems of the third world and the first world into a perfect storm. On one hand, 50% of U.S. counties lack a qualified childbirth provider. No midwife. No obstetrician. No family medicine doctor that delivers babies. In broad swaths of the country, women routinely drive several hours to get to a hospital with a maternity ward. Currently, childbirth is the most common reason for hospitalization in the United States, and cesarean delivery is now the most common major surgery performed on Americans (one out of every three births). At the same time, nearly half of cesareans performed in the United States appear to be unnecessary with significant consequences for the safety, affordability and experience of care… read more
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Inequities in Maternal Mortality: A Focus on Undocumented Immigrants
By: Rose Molina, Global Women’s Health Fellow, The Connors Center for Women’s Health and Gender Biology, Brigham and Women’s Hospital & Obstetrician/gynecologist, The Dimock Center and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical…
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Cross-sector Collaboration is Needed to Achieve the Sustainable Development Goals: Global Maternal Newborn Health Conference
By: Deepthi Wickremasinghe, Research Assistant & Information Management Specialist, IDEAS Energy and enthusiasm abounded at the Global Maternal Newborn Health Conference in Mexico City in October 2015, where knowledge and…
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Call for posts: Inequities in Maternal Mortality in the U.S.
To highlight the rising and disparate rate of maternal deaths in the U.S., the Maternal Health Task Force is launching a blog series to explore strategies to mitigate these deaths and…
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Fostering Partnerships – in Indonesia, Then Globally
By: Kate Walton, Health Specialist, Kinerja, Indonesia Last week, I had the great privilege of attending the first-ever Global Maternal Newborn Health Conference (GMNHC) in Mexico City. During a panel…
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Global Maternal Newborn Health Conference in Mexico Delivers on All Counts!
By: Abhishek Bhartia, Director, Sitaram Bhartia Institute of Science and Research, New Delhi “We discussed this internally but don’t feel I have the bandwidth to travel to Mexico,” I wrote…
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The Intervention that Improves Family Planning, Breastfeeding and Birth Preparedness
By: Jody Lori, Associate Dean for Global Affairs & Director of the WHO/PAHO Collaborating Center, University of Michigan The Maternal and Newborn Health Conference in Mexico City was motivating, energizing,…
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Civil Society Advocates Share Their Experiences Advocating for a Human Rights Based Approach to Preventing Maternal Mortality and Morbidity
By: Rima Jolivet, Maternal Health Technical Director, Maternal Health Task Force Human rights are at the center of the UN Secretary-General’s Global Strategy for Women’s, Children’s and Adolescents’ Health and…
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Empowering Women Through Group-Based Antenatal Care
By: Katie Millar, Senior Project Manager, Women and Health Initiative, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Empowerment of women has been a theme throughout the Global Maternal Newborn Health…
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From Mexico City: In India, Lower Castes and Tribals Lag Furthest Behind in Maternal Health
By: Sandeep Bathala, Senior Program Associate, Maternal Health Initiative, Wilson Center Maternal mortality causes 56,000 deaths every year in India, accounting for 20 percent of maternal deaths around the world….