Sub-Saharan Africa, home to the world’s fastest-growing population, accounts for 70% of global maternal deaths. Each year, about 180,000 women on the continent die from pregnancy-related causes, along with roughly 1 million newborns.
The crisis is especially acute in conflict zones like the Central African Republic, where war, displacement and shrinking aid have turned childbirth into a deadly gamble.
For Maude Ahmad Fadala, the danger began shortly after sunset. Her baby was coming. She was in a refugee camp near the Sudan border, weakened by typhoid. There were no facilities for delivery and she had no money for transport to the hospital. She struggled to her feet and started walking, stopping every few minutes as contractions gripped her, until she could go no farther.
“I gave birth in the street,” she said. “There was no doctor, no midwife, and no one holding my hand.”
Nearly two-thirds of maternal deaths worldwide occur in countries affected by conflict or “fragility,” the World Health Organization said this year.
