UNICEF report: Half a million women die from pregnancy complications each year

[dcsmart]

A report recently released by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), The State of the World's Children 2009, has found that women living in the least developed countries of the world are 300 times more likely to die as a result of childbirth or pregnancy-related complications than women living in the developed countries.

On the report´s release, Ann M. Veneman, UNICEF executive director, stated, "Every year, more than half a million women die as a result of pregnancy or childbirth complications, including about 70,000 girls and young women aged 15 to 19."

Globally, about 10 million women have died since 1990 due to complications arising from pregnancy and childbirth (an average of 1,500 each day), while about 4 million newborns die each year within 28 days of their birth—a rate 14 times higher than those of industrialized countries.

Even as the number of deaths of children under five has been decreasing, dropping from 13 million in 1990 to 9.2 million in 2007, maternal deaths have not seen a comparable decline.

The global maternal mortality ratio was 430 deaths per 100,000 live births in 1990, but in 2005 this ratio had only declined to 400 per 100,000. By comparison, the maternal mortality ratio for industrialized countries remained static at about 8 deaths per 100,000 live births. In order to meet the UN Millennium Development Goals, global maternal mortality would have to decrease by 75 percent between 2005 and 2015.
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FULL ARTICLE
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/jan2009/chil-j20.shtml

A link to the UNICEF report is in the full article above.

[LeftishBrit]

1. This is a hugely important and tragic issue

[Warpy]

2. Many more are left with severe damage after childbirth

Cystocele/Rectocele alone are sufficient to get them rejected by husband and family and are common in children who give birth far too soon.

Childbirth is neither easy nor safe. That is why it so desperately needs to be voluntary.

[trotsky]

3. So you've got these organizations that are *supposedly* concerned about life.

Yes, I'm looking at the Catholic Church. By denying women the right to choose when they WANT to have children, how many lives are they taking? Do they even care?

[Warpy]

4. They very reluctantly decided women had souls

only so they could condemn us to hell.

Other than that, we're just animated flowerpots to them.