The Partnership for Maternal, Newborn & Child Health has called on G8 leaders to fulfil their previous commitments to global health and commit to new, long-term financing for essential interventions that could avert the deaths of over 6 million mothers, newborns and children every year.
CAPE TOWN – Leading global health experts, policy-makers and parliamentarians convened in Cape Town last week to address the urgent need for accelerated progress to reduce maternal, newborn and child deaths, if internationally-agreed targets are to be met.
A new World Bank-IMF report warns that most countries will fall short on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), a set of eight globally agreed development goals with a due date of 2015.
Though much of the world is set to cut extreme poverty in half by then, prospects are gravest for the goals of reducing child and maternal mortality. Serious shortfalls also likely in primary school completion, nutrition, and sanitation goals.
According to the draft Health Service Development Plan (HSDP) joint UNDP and Ministry of Heath report of 2005, the per capita health service expenditure of Ethiopia is rated at 5.9 US dollars, the least among a list of other developing countries such as Kenya (31 USD), Uganda(18 USD), and Tanzania(8 USD). The report also indicated that in order to meet MDGs Ethiopia needs to increase the health service expenditure to 34 USD.
Unattended births in developing countries
Almost half of births in developing countries take place without the help of a skilled birth attendant.
sub-Saharan maternal morality rates
A woman living in sub-Saharan Africa has a 1 in 16 chance of dying in pregnancy. This compares with a 1 in 3,700 risk for a woman from North America.
Halima Gouroukoye - fistula survivor from Niger
She is now working in her community and with the UNFPA to build awareness about MDG 5 - maternal health.
(mov)
UNICEF is marking International Women’s Day 2008 (8 March) by drawing attention to the need for improvements in maternal health care.
Better access to maternal health care will reduce the estimated half a million pregnancy related deaths that occur each year and also help reduce child mortality rates.
Ana Agostino - The Importance of Women in Ending Poverty
Ana Agostino is Co-Chair of GCAP and the facilitator for the Feminist
Task Force (FTF) . This year the FTF use the International Women’s Day
to highlight the centrality of gender equality to end poverty and the
importance of investing in women and girls. They are also calling for
financing of gender equality and women’s empowerment.
When the 189 UN Member States adopted the Millennium Declaration in 2000, they committed their respective governments to drastically cut the incidence of poverty by half and make the world a better place for everybody to live not later than 2015. The commitments in the declaration are espoused in a set of eight goals with achievable targets, commonly referred to as the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
