Every day, Mexican mothers die before even giving birth

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

Despite having the fourteenth largest economy in the world, Mexico ranks in 76th place when it comes to the maternal mortality rate.

The lack of education, early pregnancy, reliance on native languages instead of Spanish, lack of social security or health insurance, lack of trained birth attendants and long transportation times from homes to health centres are some of the reasons why Mexico is not even close to fulfilling Millenium Development Goal number 5, which seeks to reduce by three quarters the maternal mortality rate by the end of 2015.

“There is still one pregnant women out of every 48 who dies in Mexico” declared Luis del Rio, national director – World Vision Mexico. “It is unacceptable because we have skills and the infrastructure to prevent thousands of deaths associated with pregnancy.”

That is why World Vision Mexico recently launched the Child Health Now campaign, which will focus on advocacy to improve the access of women and children to health services.

“In this situation, we invite civil society, the private sector and the federal government to make a concerted effort to achieve the goals” stated Mr del Rio during the launch.

For the launch, World Vision Mexico invited two famous Mexican artists to show sculptures that they created under the theme “Mothers who did not [survive]”. At various locations in Mexico City, sculptures of young pregnant women’s skeletons covered by white blankets, representing the mothers who died before becoming mothers, were displayed to raise awareness on the issue.

Next steps

World Vision Mexico plans to conduct research to assess the current situation of the country on this issue, which will help authorities, private sector and civil society to make decisions and evaluate possible actions to prevent deaths associated with pregnancy, childbirth and postpartum issues.

Through the campaign, they are also inviting citizens to sign an online petition to request the President of the Republic, Enrique Peña Nieto, to take final action on this issue.

With this initiative, World Vision also hopes to contribute to the formation of a national alliance to accelerate the reduction of maternal and perinatal mortality and thereby help the country to comply with the targets set in the Millennium Development Goals.