Maternal deaths still high in Kenya, says report

By Elizabeth Mwai

Kenya is currently losing more than 7,000 women annually, a rate of 21 daily, to pregnancy related complications, a new report has said.

About eleven million African women could be saved in the next five years if life saving interventions are made available, the report says.

The report, Partnership for Maternal Newborn and Child Health and the Countdown to 2015, estimates that scaling up antenatal and emergency care at the time of birth will cost an additional Sh640 ($8) a person annually.

"This achievement would bring most African countries in line with UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) 4 and 5, which call for reducing deaths among children under five by two thirds, and maternal deaths by three-quarters by 2015," says the report.

The report found that 49 of the 68 high burden countries are not on track to meeting the fourth MDG on child health. At least 39 of the 49 countries that are not on track to achieve the goal are in Sub-Saharan Africa, and that progress has not been sufficient to meet the fifth goal.

Kenya’s high rate of maternal deaths has remained unchanged for almost seven years.

More than half of Kenyan women prefer to deliver at home under the care of unskilled attendants, hence the high number of deaths.

Africa, with 11 per cent of the world’s population, accounts for more than half of its maternal and child deaths, 85 per cent of malaria cases and 72 per cent of HIV and Aids-related deaths.