Tackle maternal health disparities, mortality with data and better care [View all]

[Jilly_in_VA]

I’ve been working to expand access to affordable health coverage for children and families for more than two decades. After the birth of my daughter, I heard with different ears the story of my own birth – the nurses sent my dad home “to rest” and left my mother laboring overnight without checking on her because they didn’t want “to disturb the doctor on Sunday.”

I realize now how my or my mother’s life could have ended in tragedy. When a family member of mine recently experienced a stillbirth, I knew well that the health care system might have contributed to her personal heartbreak and how far we need to go to address maternal and child health outcomes. And as a mother, I am reminded that my risk of dying in childbirth is more than three times the risk for a woman with the same education, income level and insurance – just because I’m a Black woman.

What I’ve experienced personally is a symptom of our country’s devastating racial and ethnic disparities in maternal health outcomes. The United States has the worst maternal mortality rate among industrialized countries. American Indian/Alaska Native and Black women are two to three times more likely to die from a pregnancy-related cause than white women. And two out of three pregnancy-related deaths in this country are preventable.

On Tuesday, under the leadership of Vice President Kamala Harris, the White House is convening a nationwide Maternal Health Day of Action. The vice president, White House domestic policy adviser Susan Rice and Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra have a longstanding commitment to addressing maternal health disparities. We are using all the tools at our disposal to effect change.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2021/12/07/maternal-health-day-give-parents-support-they-need/8800041002/
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Very good story but mortality and complications are also high for poor and underserved white women (I know this because I worked briefly in neonatal in Appalachia).