Health care for women: The hard facts
When governments fail to act:
"In the health centre they get annoyed when they treat you. If you don't have any money they won't take you. Then what? Well, you'll just be left to die."
Marta Maria Molina Aguilar, mother of sick child, Nicaragua.
In Yemen, if a woman has a baby, she has only a one in five chance of being attended by a midwife. If she and her child survive childbirth, her child has a one in three chance of being malnourished and a one in nine chance of dying before their fifth birthday. If she lives in a rural area, her family are unlikely to be able to access medical care, clean water, or basic sanitation.
Missing professionals
Long-term investment in health care is critical. At least 75 countries do not have enough trained health workers to meet their needs. Just 1 more midwife could save the lives of 219 women. To overcome this critical situation there needs to be another 700,000 midwives globally.
Unaffordable care
Because of their role as caretakers of sick family members, women often suffer hardest, putting their own needs last when it comes to seeking medical attention with costs involved. The high prices mean that patients must either skip treatment or choose between medicines and other basic necessities.
Women's rights
In some countries, discrimination and injustice can mean that women can't always choose the terms of their own health care. Women and girls have less access to education, assets, services, and security. Alongside better hospitals and midwives, the status of women must improve. Women must have access to family planning and education so that they can choose when to have children.
Change is possible even in low-income countries
A woman in Sri Lanka is just as likely to have a midwife at her side during childbirth as a woman in the UK. In Sri Lanka, along with Botswana, Mauritius, Costa Rica and Cuba, invest highly in public health care systems. Because of this there is a high proportion of women among healthcare workers and they have been instrumental in encouraging women and girls to use these services.
Progress is often achieved by simultaneously working with women's groups, changing laws and challenging harmful beliefs.
Push for action
Private health services simply don't deliver for poor people. Only poor countries that rely mainly on public health services have succeeded in providing health care for everyone.
