Maternal Mortality and Pregnancy Complications: A Current Scenario from Low-Income Countries

Safe motherhood initiative started at Nairobi in February 1987 aimed to reduce maternal mortalityMaternal mortality in developing countries by 50% in a decade. However, still in 2023, millions of womenWomen die each year due to pregnancyPregnancy related complications. This chapter thus focuses on SDGs related to good healthHealth and wellbeingWell-being and examines the aspects leading to poor maternal healthMaternal health and pregnancy complicationPregnancy complications. The proposed book chapter will review the facts, factors, and challenges for maternal healthMaternal health in low-income countries. Health care initiatives, traditional and modern birthBirth practices, antenatal care servicesAntenatal care services (ANC), vaccination, healthy nutritionNutrition and its determinants are strongly related to the maternal healthMaternal health status. Furthermore, socio-cultural, and political aspects, family planningFamily planning, decision-making powerPower structure and gender inequality are equally involved in terms of poor healthHealth seeking behaviors during pregnancyPregnancy. Since, previous coronavirusCoronavirus epidemics have known to have adverse effects on feto-maternal outcomes. The recent effects of COVID-19 willCoronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) augment the issue of pregnancy complicationsPregnancy complications and perinatal outcomes respectively. The adverse effect of COVID-19 will further deteriorate the situation of foodFoods insecurity and malnutritionMalnutrition among pregnant womenWomen leading to high risk of maternal mortalityMaternal mortality. Current literature shows that COVID-19 during pregnancyPregnancy is associated with an increased risk of preterm birthPreterm birth, cesarean section, miscarriageMiscarriage, pre-eclampsiaPre-eclampsia, and maternal deathsMaternal death. An ongoing interplay of above-mentioned i.e., poor antenatal care services, malnutritionMalnutrition and its determinants, socio-economical aspects, lack of family planningFamily planning, gender discrimination and lack of decision-making powerPower making womenWomen more vulnerable to morbidity and mortality particularly in low-income countries.