Why is reproductive, maternal and newborn health important?

Every year more than a third of a million women die from complications during pregnancy and childbirth – the vast majority in developing countries. This means at least one woman dies every 90 seconds. For every woman that dies another 20 women suffer from chronic ill-health or disability. All of this reduces the chances of a newborn baby surviving. More than 3.5 million babies die each year within their first month of life – up to 45% of these deaths are in the first 24 hours.

This is why we are working hard to improve the health of women. In Afghanistan and Sierra Leone the risk of a woman dying from complications during pregnancy and childbirth is 1 in 8 compared with 1 in 8,200 in the UK. And, lack of family planning contributes to nearly 20 million women seeking an unsafe abortion each year, with 70,000 of them, many still girls, dying as a result. There are 215 million women around the world who want to use modern contraception but don’t have access to it. Risk of maternal death is increased by factors such as undernutrition, malaria and HIV.

By increasing women’s ability to choose when and how often they have a child, and ensuring pregnancy and child birth is safe for all women, this can have a significant positive impact on families, economies and societies, as well as the health and empowerment of women themselves.

Women at the heart of development

By putting girls and women at the heart of our work we can make a real difference to all poor people’s lives. Almost two-thirds of the 750 million people who are illiterate in the developing world are women. In Africa, children of mothers who have spent five years in primary education are 40% more likely to live beyond the age of five. By improving women’s rights and choices we can help increase their access to education, family planning, secure livelihoods, and ensuring their own children are educated. And this benefits their whole community, as women put an average of 90% of their earnings back into the family compared to the 30% to 40% that men contribute.

With the most off-track Millennium Development Goal being maternal health, it is more critical than ever to focus our efforts in this area. As Secretary of State Andrew Mitchell said in his speech at the Carnegie Endowment, in Washington DC:

‘This is a time to reaffirm our promises to the world’s poor, not abandon them. We should never balance the books on the backs of the world’s poorest people…We have within our grasp a golden opportunity, a perfect moment when we have the technology and the political will – if not to eradicate maternal mortality – then to reduce it significantly.‘

Understand the real issues relating to reproductive, maternal and newborn health.