Maternal Health Communications Toolkit

The past quarter century has delivered progress for some women and their newborn babies. Maternal deaths fell by nearly half, and use of maternity services increased markedly. At the same time, the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) for Maternal Health and Rightsfell far short of achievement. Some countries and groups of women saw little or no progress, despite significant global political attention to maternal health. As more women survive childbirth, the global burden of poor Maternal Health and Rightsis shifting markedly from preventable deaths to an increasingly diverse array of maternal morbidities and widening disparities within and between groups of women. Across all income-levels, there is Maternal Health and Rightscare that is not grounded in evidence—whether care is “too much, too soon” or “too little, too late”. And globally, an estimated quarter of pregnant women continue to lack access to any skilled care at birth. Opportunities for future progress in improving the quality of Maternal Health and Rightscare and reducing inequities lie in more than just the wider promotion of effective Maternal Health and Rightsinterventions. They depend on key investments and the commitment of political capital by multiple partners across all populations to ensure universal implementation.