Help Fight Maternal Mortality

by Aimee Sea · 2010-05-19 06:14:00 UTC
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Last month, Daniel Gerstle and Alex DiBranco wrote about the recent Lancet study finding that worldwide maternal deaths have declined 35 percent in the past two decades. The news was greeted with guarded optimism. The findings demonstrate that maternal health is not an insurmountable issue, but that we must keep pushing for policies and programs that continue to reduce maternal mortality. Such policies and programs are part of H.R. 5121, the Global Sexual and Reproductive Health Act of 2010.

In a response to the Lancet study, former U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson wrote, “the new evidence is encouraging, but must not be allowed to undermine the urgency of addressing maternal mortality and health as a basic human right.”

To that end, I'm asking you to sign a petition urging your U.S. Representative to support the Global Sexual and Reproductive Health Act of 2010. Introduced by Rep. Yvette Clark of New York, the act would provide an integrated, coordinated approach to reproductive and sexual health by addressing family planning, reproductive cancer treatment, sex education, STI and HIV prevention and treatment, the reduction of unsafe abortions, and the elimination of female genital mutilation.

According to Serra Sippel, President of the Center for Health and Gender Equity, the act would also end the current piecemeal approach to global reproductive health, which marginalizes women’s health, by requiring the executive branch to institute a strategy linking reproductive and sexual health to other aspects of health care. This policy shift would mark “the government’s first move towards evidence-based reproductive health policies that have the potential to significantly impact global health.”

Even with the decline in maternal mortality, a woman dies of pregnancy-related complications every 90 seconds. In the time it takes you to read this post and sign the petition, two to three women will have died — women who are mothers and sisters and wives and friends. So please, take action now. Their lives depend on it.

Photo credit: motherburst

Aimee Sea is a proud New Englander who blogs about global women's rights and whatever else happens to catch her eye.

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