The True Costs of Maternal Death: Individual Tragedy Impacts Family, Community and Nations

Posted by Share-Net NL on May 11, 2015 at 5:22 am



What happens when a mother dies? In the West, the most obvious answer is grief – the harrowing emotional and psychological toll of losing a loved one. A mother’s death is largely viewed as a private tragedy that will grow more manageable in time.

But in many developing countries, a mother’s death is much more than an emotional crisis, often leading to long-term social and economic breakdown, both for her immediate family and for the wider community. A new, special issue of Reproductive Health (an open-access journal) focuses exclusively on the immediate and longer-term effects of maternal death on surviving children, households, and communities.
Entitled “The True Costs of Maternal Death: Individual Tragedy Impacts Family, Community and Nations,” the new issue features seven studies, with data drawn from four African countries – Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, and South Africa.
ICRW’s study, “A Price Too High to Bear: The Costs of Maternal Mortality to Families and Communities”, done in conjunction with Family Care International and the KEMRI-CDC Research and Public Health Collaboration, is featured in the special issue. The report focuses on the financial and social costs of maternal mortality for families and communities in Kenya.
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