The UNICEF said, a global effort to reduce deaths during pregnancy & child birth is likely to fail unless action is taken to improve health care in the developing world. Half a million mothers die each year, most in Africa & Asia where obstetrical & post-natal care is often unavailable and many pregnancies are complicated by HIV.
Ann Veneman, UNICEF's executive director said, "Progress has been made in reducing child mortality, but much more must be done especially in addressing maternal and newborn health, the world must approach this task with a shared sense of urgency and a collaborative response."
The UN has called for a 75% reduction in the maternal mortality rate by 2015 as part of its Millennium Development Goals program. About 99% of the estimated 536,000 maternal deaths worldwide in 2005 occurred outside industrialized nations, more than half of them in Africa. Poor nations were more than 300 times more likely to die in childbirth or pregnancy related complications than those in the developed world and children were almost 14 times more likely to die during the first month of life.
UNICEF said many of the deaths could be reduced by improving family planning and post natal-care and ensuring that trained medical personnel were on hand for deliveries. About four in 10 of all births worldwide are not attended by a doctor or other health professional. Providing HIV drugs to infected women also would improve the chances of survival for new mothers and their babies.
According to UNICEF, the riskiest place to give birth was Niger, where the chance of dying in pregnancy or childbirth over the course of a woman's lifetime is one in seven. The safest place was Ireland where the risk was one in 47,600. Liberia had the highest rate of neonatal mortality at 66 deaths per 1,000 live births.
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