SAFE MOTHERHOOD

WHAT IS THE
SAFEMOTHERHOOD INITIATIVE?
• Is a global effort that aim to reduce deaths
and illnesses among women and infants,
especially in developing countries
• Was launched in 1987 to improve maternal
health and cut the number of maternal
deaths in half by the year 2000.
 SAFE MOTHERHOOD
GOAL
To improve well being of mothers
through a comprehensive approach of
providing, preventing, promotive ,
curative and rehabilitative health care
 SAFE MOTHERHOOD
OBJECTIVE
Improve quality and increase access to
family planning and maternal health care
services
Educate couples to ensure they have the
best chance for a wanted and safe
pregnancy
• To promote improvement of systems for
monitoring maternal and newborn health
services;
• To promote the implementation of evidence-
based integrated cost-effective reproductive
health interventions with a focus on maternal
and newborn health within primary health care
approach;
• To conduct operations research to generate
best practices and evidence for addressing
priority reproductive health problems.
BURDEN OF
MATERNAL
DEATH
359 DEATHS PER DAY
20% OF DEATHS OF
MATERNAL DEATHS
ARE IN India
THE FOUR PILLARS OF SAFE
MOTHERHOOD
SAFE MOTHERHOOD

OBSTETRIC CARE
CLEAN SAFE
ANTENATAL

DELIVERY

ESSENTIALY
PLANNING

CARE
FAMILY

BASIC MATERNITY CARE

PRIMARY HEALTH CARE

EQUITY FOR WOMEN

 NATIONAL SAFE MOTHERHOOD
DAY 2012 THEME

“Ensuring quality services for

safe motherhood”
 ENSURING SAFE MOTHERHOOD
Safe motherhood means ensuring that all women
have access to the information and services they need
to go safely through pregnancy and
childbirth. It includes :
• Education on safe motherhood
• Prenatal care
• Promotion of maternal nutrition
• Adequate delivery assistance in all cases
• Provisions for obstetric emergencies including referral
services for pregnancy, childbirth and
abortion complications
• Postnatal care.
 SUPPORT FOR SAFE
MOTHERHOOD INITIATIVES
Safe Motherhood Day‟ which is observed on the
11th of April every year, was marked by two
events in India, in which UNICEF played a key
role.
The Government of India in collaboration with
The White Ribbon Alliance (WRAI) for Safe
Motherhood (of which UNICEF is an active
member), organized a national stakeholders‟
meeting, in the capital Delhi, to discuss the
pressing priorities in relation to women‟s health.
 Dr. Marzio Babille, Chief of Health for
UNICEF India, who took part in the
national stakeholders meeting, said the
country‟s focus should be on a life-cycle
approach to women‟s health. He said,
UNICEF believes in addressing women
during their adolescence, when
reproductive and other lifestyle
behaviours set the stage for later life.
 EVENT OF SAFE MOTHERHOOD DAY
• UNICEF in partnership
with the World Health
Organisation (WHO) and
the Health Fitness Trust
organised an „Awareness
Run‟, also in Delhi, for
school children on issues
relating to safe
motherhood.
• White Ribbon Alliance for
Safe Motherhood of India, an
alliance committed towards
increasing public awareness
on preventing maternal deaths
is organizing the Aakhir Kyon
Concert on 26thMarch, 2012
at Amphitheatre, India Habitat
Centre, New Delhi where
Shubha Mudgal will release a
special song dedicated to Safe
Motherhood. Birth is life how
can this be allowed to be the
cause of death? Especially
when most of such deaths are
so easily preventable
• School of Public Health,
PGIMER in
collaboration with
Chandigarh Health
Administration
celebrated “Safe
Motherhood Day” at
their Maternal and Child
Health centre at
Polyclinic, Sector-45
today with about 100
pregnant and lactating
mothers.
• About 100,000 deaths occur
annually in India from causes
related to pregnancy and
childbirth. In Orissa, the
maternal mortality rate (MMR)
is about 303 while the national
average is 254, states a new
report released by „Deliver Now
for Women and Children‟
campaign.
Members from the White
Ribbon Alliance
for Safe Motherhood(WRAI)
and Partnership of Maternal,
Newborn and Child
Health (PMNCH) had launched
a national campaign last year on
April 11, with special focus on
Orissa.
• Nagaland observes Safe
Motherhood Day
Putting effort to spread
awareness on saving
mothers‟ lives, „Safe
Motherhood Day‟ was
launched globally in 1997
to promote, increase public
awareness on the need to
make pregnancy and
childbirth safe for all
women and newborns,
especially in developing
countries.
• WRA Indonesia and the Women Caucus
Parliament of the Republic of Indonesia (KPP-
RI) successfully hosted a seminar on “Strategic
Position and Commitment of the Parliament
Members for Safe Motherhood.” The
integrated approach toward safe motherhood is
not only to include mother‟s health during
pregnancy, childbirth and the post partum
period, but also child health, especially during
the first day of a child's life, and emphasizing
exclusive breast feeding.
 LIFE CYCLE APPROACH OF WOMEN
• Reproductive health is a lifetime concern for both
women and men, from infancy to old age. In many
cultures, the discrimination against girls and women
that begins in infancy can determine the trajectory of
their lives.
The important issues of education and appropriate
health care arise in childhood and adolescence. These
continue to be issues in the reproductive years, along
with family planning, sexually transmitted diseases and
reproductive tract infections, adequate nutrition and
care in pregnancy, and the social status of women and
concerns about cervical and breast cancer.
Critical messages for different life stages
In its advocacy and programming, UNFPA
focuses on key messages that can empower
both women and men at different stages of their
lives.
Girls and boys
• Inform and empower girls to delay pregnancy
until they are physically and emotionally
mature.
• Inspire and motivate boys and men to be
sexually responsible partners and value
daughters equally as sons.
• Encourage governments to take responsibility
for the human catastrophe of orphans and other
children who live in the streets.
Adolescents
• Reorient health education and services to meet the
diverse needs of adolescents. Integrated reproductive
health education and services for young people should
include family planning information, and counselling
on gender relations, STDs and HIV/AIDS, sexual abuse
and reproductive health.
• Ensure that health care programmes and providers'
attitudes allow for adolescents' access to the services
and information they need.
• Support efforts to eradicate female genital cutting and
other harmful practices, including early or forced
marriage, sexual abuse, and trafficking of adolescents
for forced labour, marriage or commercial sex.
• Socialize and motivate boys and young men to show
respect and responsibility in sexual relations.
Adulthood
• Improve communication between men and women on
issues of sexuality and reproductive health.
• Enable women to exercise their right to control their
own fertility and their right to make decisions
concerning reproduction and discrimination and
violence.
• Improve the quality and availability of reproductive
health services and barriers to access.
• Make emergency obstetric care available to all women
who experience complications in their pregnancies.
• Encourage men's responsibility for sexual and
reproductive behaviour and increase male participation
in family planning.
The older years
• Reorient and strengthen health care services to
better meet the needs of older women.
• Support outreach by women's NGOs to help
older women in the community to better
understand the importance of girls' education,
reproductive rights and sexual health so that
they may become effective transmitters of this
knowledge.