One thing I really feel the need to write today is how thankful I am.
How thankful I am that I live in a country where midwifery is in general a respected profession. Where the maternal mortality rate is (last time i checked) around 12 women in 100,000. Which isn't good enough - I know; but it sure beats living in places such as Somalia where the maternal mortality rate is into the thousands.
We complain about the shortage of midwives in the UK. We compaign, rally and write petitions to try to urge the government to start training and hiring more midwives. In some areas over 40% of the midwives are coming up to retirement age, and no provisions have been made to train enough midwives to cover even half of that, which means soon the shortage will be worse than ever.
But to put it into perspective - WHO have estimated that worldwide there is an urgent shortage of over 350,000 midwives.
In 2011, UNFPA published a report on 58 countries that together account for 91% of maternal deaths in the world. They worked out that over 3 million lives could be saved each year if there were 112,000 more midwives or skilled birth attendants practicing in these countries. Over 60,000 of these midwives are needed in just 8 countries that account for 56% of all maternal deaths.
And although many people think of attending births when they think of midwives, midwifery is so much more. Midwives have a unique position working with women and their families to make a real impact on public health. Many women we meet here in the UK have had barely any contact with health care professionals before becoming pregnant, especially those coming from deprived backgrounds.
We often have the privilege of supporting women to take control over their own health, women who may not have cared about their own wellbeing before a baby was part of the equation - or women who wanted help but didn't know how or where to find it. Midwives can become a bit of a one stop shop - supporting, advising, counselling or referring to other healthcare professionals - on topics ranging from diet, mental health, employment rights, contraception. You name it, if we can't help you we will find you somebody who can.
And speaking of contraception - one last thing before I finish. Something I'm interested in, and keen to learn more about, is how we can improve family planning throughout the globe. Here we are lucky, contraception is something not too many people worry about. We have a lot of options and trained healthcare professionals to support us through our choices. We have clinics we can attend, or we can use the internet to find out what type of contraception is available. We have the morning after pill and termination is legal. Women in many developing countries who don't want, or literally cannot afford another baby do not have access to contraception and nearly a third of maternal deaths in the world are due to unsafe terminations and complications that arise from them.
I openly admit that I am quite ignorant about these issues - I suppose it isn't something you have to think about whilst working here. It is however something I'm deeply interested in and passionate about so I intend to change that. My plan for the next year is to learn more about the problems faced worldwide for mothers and babies, so hopefully by International Day of the Midwife 2014 I will be a bit more knowledgeable about this. I have to understand the worlds problems before I try to help them :)
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