The following table shows the primary causes of direct obstetric death in 2002

Maternal mortality figures from the past few years show that the distribution by age has not varied, with the majority of deaths occurring between the ages of 20 and 34.

(i) Maternal mortality ratio (number of deaths per 100,000 registered live births)

Caesarean sections accounted for 70 per cent of the latter.

The following table shows the distribution of direct and indirect obstetric deaths.

The departments of this region have historically had the highest maternal mortality.

The absolute risk of maternal death during pregnancy and the puerperium remains very small, being 1 in 8,423 confinements in the triennium 1997 1999.

In 2002, 16 women had their babies at checkpoints and 11 babies died.

Table 11 Maternal mortality, by obstetric cause, 2002

Table 12 Maternal mortality, by primary cause of death, 2002

Fourteen of the deaths were attributed to indirect obstetric causes.

463. There is no data to break down the figures relating to maternity mortality into occurrence before or after childbirth.

Una mirada rápida a los años 2000 2002. Review of the maternal mortality records compiled by the Department of Comprehensive Health Care for Women, Children and Young Persons and information generated by the maternal mortality surveillance system of the Ministry of Health.

There is a high rate of births at home in the provinces with the highest rates of infant mortality.

Table 13 Non obstetric maternal mortality, 2001 2002

The mortality rate for Caesarean sections is estimated at 77 179 deaths per 100,000 live births, while the rate for vaginal deliveries is 13 17 per 100,000 live births.

In 2000 2001, 31 pregnant women delivered at checkpoints and 17 of the babies died.

According to those statistics, only 1.3 per cent of deaths are related to pregnancy and childbirth.

Maternal mortality among black women is 2.6 per 100,000 births and .003 for white women.

As a result, maternal and child mortality rates were extremely high in the region, with South Asia recording the highest maternal mortality rate of 650 maternal deaths per 100,000 births.

In 2003 and 2004, only 8 and 6 women gave birth at checkpoints, while 3 and 5 of the babies died, respectively.

Source Ministry of Health, maternal mortality surveillance system.

These problems have a physical and mental impact on affected individuals. They can also have long term socio economic effects which do not impact the victims only but also their families and eventually society and state. The main problems faced by the adolescent community are

Septicaemia is the leading cause of death in both normal vaginal deliveries and Caesarean sections.

Also, looked at from the standpoint of the person who attended the delivery, 42.9 per cent of the women who died were attended by a birth attendant (midwife), while only one third of maternal mortalities occurred in deliveries attended by a doctor.

As in the case of child mortality most cases of maternal death (74 per cent) are directly associated with pregnancy, childbirth and the puerperium.

There's a story that Clegg's wife was attacked by a mulatto, and died in childbirth.

For every 100,000 births, 800 women die in childbirth, yet there has been no decline in the 6.7 per cent fertility rate.

Pan American Health Organization World Health Organization (PAHO WHO), Special Program for Health Analysis, Health Situation in the Americas Basic Indicators 2002 (maternal and infant mortality).

Deaths associated with pregnancy, parturition and post partum a category which includes deaths associated with abortions of any kind do not appear among the 20 principal causes of death among women in Mexico.

In an effort to improve the health situation of Nicaraguan women, the Ministry of Health included a safe motherhood initiative in its maternal mortality reduction plan.

Mothers still die in childbirth.

Life expectancy was only 45 years infant mortality was around 128 per thousand births, while maternal mortality was among the highest in the world, at 1,289 per 100,000 births.

The risk of maternal death between 1997 and 1999 was highest for women aged between 40 and 44 years (mortality ratio of 23.2 deaths per 100,000 confinements), and was lowest for women aged between 20 and 24 years (with a ratio of 4.0).

224. The same study found that the causes of maternal death related either to miscarriage or to delivery.

Furthermore, the majority of maternal deaths in rural areas are related to the geographical inaccessibility of health care services.

The miscarriage rate was calculated at one for every four or five deliveries, which gives a rate of 122 152 deaths per 100,000 miscarriages.

Australia's maternal mortality ratio of 8.2 maternal deaths per 100,000 confinements for the triennium 1997 1999, while not as low as that observed in the 1991 1993 triennium, is a return to the steady decline of the ratio observed over the past 24 years.

Ministry of Health, Situación Nacional de Mortalidad Materna, 2002. Taken from Ministry of Health PAHO WHO.

The percentage of women dying during childbirth has declined from 43.2 per 10,000 live births in 1998 to 41.5 per 10,000 live births in 1999.

219. In 1991, 333 maternal deaths were recorded, one third of which were due to miscarriages and two thirds to obstetric causes.

Every day, a mother dies giving birth.

The mortality rate of women who have just given birth is also one of reliable indicators that indicate the effectiveness of health care protection.

In the post war period, data on the mortality of women who have just given birth were not published, but it is estimated that there was an increase in its rate.

26 weeks where she is delivered of more than one child on any given confinement and eight weeks where her child is stillborn or dies during the first six weeks of life.