Our Focus
Call to action
© UNFPA.
Esther is a humanitarian midwife trained by UNFPA to support women and girls who are internally displaced in DRC due to conflict. Risks of complications during pregnancy and birth increase during a crisis. Here in the village of Zaa, jn the ‘Logo’ health zone, in October 2023.
Call to action
© WHO
A newborn in Al-Alwiya Hospital in Baghdad, Iraq, in May 2023.
Less resources, less time, more strategy: 5 actions to get back on track for maternal and newborn health and the reduction of stillbirths.
Foreign aid cuts, constrained national budgets and a rollback of rights risk decades of progress. At the current rate, over 60 countries will not meet the Sustainable Development Goals for maternal and newborn health.
EWENE calls for 5 actions to get back on track and end preventable maternal, newborn and child deaths and stillbirths.
1
Optimize resources
2
Prioritize off-track countries & fragile settings
3
Focus on the subnational level
4
Ensure quality of care
5
Center families & communities
1
Optimize resources
Align investments with EWENE targets. In particular, prioritize the recruitment, training, equitable deployment and retention of the health workforce, and access to quality-assured commodities. Mobilize domestic resources, and align global funding under government leadership.
2
Prioritize off-track countries & fragile settings
Prioritize countries and regions where women’s and newborns’ ability to access the care they need is further limited by conflict, climate crises and humanitarian crises.
3
Focus on the subnational level
Develop subnational EWENE targets, plans and budgets, and track subnational data to ensure equitable progress.
See the example of Kenya (from 15’37”).
4
Ensure quality of care
Track quality of care, not just service coverage, and ensure the private sector is accountable for the services it provides.
5
Center families & communities
Advocate for the presence of birth companions, the possibility of mothers to be in newborn units, strengthen community-led monitoring and community maternal and perinatal death surveillance and response (MPDSR).
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