Enfermeria Basica

Women on the Front Lines of Health Care
State of the World's Mothers 2010

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CHapter titLe goe s He r e

Contents

2 Foreword by Bridget Lynch 3 introduction by Jasmine Whitbread and Charles F. MacCormack 5 executive summary: Key Findings and recommendations 9 Women Helping Women: a powerful Force for Health and survival 18 saving Mothers and Children in Bangladesh 20 a Midwife inevery Village in indonesia 22 overcoming Cultural Barriers to Health Care in pakistan 24 ethiopia puts Female Health Workers in rural areas Where they are Needed Most 26 Decentralizing Health Care in tanzania 28 Fighting Maternal Mortality in Honduras 31 take action Now to train More Health Workers and save Mothers’ and Babies’ Lives 32 appendix: 11th annual Mothers’ index and Country rankings 37Methodology and research Notes 41 endnotes

save the Children every one We are fighting to give millions more children a chance at life. our goal is to see the achievement of Millennium Development goal 4, so that 5 million fewer children die every year. every child has the right to survive. eVerY oNe.

Front cover Front cover: in Malawi, a community health worker named Madalitso visits the homeof a mother and her 5-day-old baby, shanil. Madalitso takes the baby’s temperature, checks on the health of the mother, and gives advice about breastfeeding and care for her newborn. Photo by Michael Bisceglie © save the Children, May 2010. all rights reserved. isBN 1-888393-22-X

Bangladesh •

Women on the Front Lines of Health Care
in commemoration of Mother’s Day, save the Children ispublishing its eleventh annual State of the World’s Mothers report. the focus is on the critical shortage of health workers in the developing world and the urgent need for more female health workers to save the lives of mothers, newborn babies and young children. every year, 50 million women in the developing world give birth with no professional help and 8.8 million children and newborns die fromeasily preventable or treatable causes. this report identifies countries that have invested in training and deploying more female health workers and shows how these women are delivering lifesaving health care to some of the poorest and hardest-to-reach mothers and babies. it identifies strategies and approaches that are succeeding in the fight to save lives, and shows that effective solutions to thischallenge are affordable – even in the world’s poorest countries.

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Foreword

Bridget Lynch President International Confederation of Midwives

It is appropriate and compelling that the launch of this report on May 5 coincides with the annual International Day of the Midwife. Women are the main providers of care within the family and in communities and health facilities. In both theformal and informal health system, midwives working alongside other female health providers in the community have the greatest potential to improve the reproductive health of women and save the lives of mothers and babies in the developing world. The global community made a commitment in 2000 to “create an environment – at the national and global levels alike – which is conducive to development andto the elimination of poverty.” This commitment led to agreement on eight Millennium Development Goals. Central among those goals are MDGs 4 and 5, which aim to improve women’s reproductive health and reduce maternal and child mortality. Achieving these goals will not only save the lives of millions of women, newborns and children, but also contribute to achieving the other goals related to health,education, equity and poverty reduction. Yet most countries are not on track to meet MDGs 4 and 5, which call for reducing maternal mortality by three-quarters and child mortality by two-thirds between 1990 and 2015. Urgent global action and support is needed for those countries to get on track in the coming five years. We know what is needed to save lives. Proven, cost-effective interventions,...