Since 2010, countries supported by the Maternal and Newborn Health Fund have reduced maternal mortality by 40%, nearly twice the global rate, contributing to avert an estimated 75,000 maternal deaths. The Maternal and Newborn Health Fund is UNFPA’s flagship initiative to expand equitable access to quality reproductive, maternal, and newborn healthcare.

The Fund’s Annual Impact Report 2024, released this month, details significant progress in reducing maternal and newborn mortality in 32 priority countries. In particular, the report highlights the impact of training and deploying midwives, enhancing emergency obstetric and newborn care, supporting national maternal and perinatal death surveillance and response systems and providing surgical fistula repair.

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The World Health Organization maternal, newborn, child and adolescent health e-handbook is a new resource for Ministry of health programme managers. It offers  step-by-step guidance for implementing effective health programmes, from planning to monitoring and evaluation, with concise overviews of key activities and interventions along the life course.  The e-handbook references WHO documents, to ensure that programme managers have access to evidence-based strategies and best practices tailored to various contexts.

This e-handbook contains a prioritised list of documents; for a full list of documents go to the resource library for maternal, newborn, child, adolescent health and ageing: https://uhcc.who.int/mca/

A new journal supplement, “Born Too Soon: progress, priorities and pivots for preterm birth,” led by PMNCH, was published in BMC Reproductive Health last month. The supplement adapts and expands the content from the 2023 WHO report “Born Too Soon: A Decade of Action on Preterm Birth.”

Globally, a baby is born preterm every two seconds, and a preterm newborn dies every 40 seconds, making preterm birth the leading cause of under-five deaths.

Authors highlight the progress made in the last decade, outline the need for improved data to enhance programs, and emphasize the necessity for comprehensive, high-quality, and respectful sexual, reproductive, and maternal health services.  They call for investments in small and sick newborn care to ensure equitable access, particularly in conflict areas and among marginalized populations.  For the first time, this supplement also focuses on human rights law and global health processes and their role in upholding the rights of women, babies, parents, families, and healthcare providers.

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