Inside the worst places on earth to give birth
The muted beeps of the neonatal intensive care unit are drowned out by a sudden scramble of sound. A bundle is rushed into the corridor of this hospital in the Central African Republic (CAR) with a gaggle of people in its wake.
Under the swaddle of cloth is a newborn baby girl, eyes closed, her chest heaving with tortured, syncopated breaths. “unanimously”
Nurses quickly connect the baby up to a confusion of monitors, tubes and drips. A roar of a ventilator kicks in. The baby’s grandmother looks on anxiously.
Emmaus Johann, the doctor and seventh-year medical student, looks grimly at the statistics on the monitor. They have tried intubation, ventilation and now CPR. Blood is seeping onto the blanket. The newborn’s face goes grey. Her tiny body gives in.
“There was no ambulance. The only ambulance had taken a different child. There is nothing else out there,” the doctor says as the baby’s grandmother shatters into sobs in the background.
“They came just like that… by motorbike,” he continues, trailing off.
This is the only dedicated paediatric hospital in the whole of CAR, a small landlocked country of five million people that suffers from some of the highest maternal and early infant mortality rates in the world.
This little girl has been brought in from a rural area 10km outside the capital. After a difficult labour, she was struggling with birth asphyxia. She had been on this earth for about two hours, and had spent almost all of it on the back of a speeding motorcycle in the desperate rush to get here.
“There’s a lack of equipment and care. There should be a neonatology service out there. But there isn’t one,” Dr Johann continues.
“If the baby comes to us this late without oxygen, we cannot resuscitate her; it’s part of our daily routine,” he adds quietly.
And the fear is this horrific situation is only going to get worse.
For centuries, giving birth was one of the most dangerous conditions a woman could go through: mothers and their babies died regularly in childbirth.
But over the last 25 years, that changed. Combined global efforts saw maternal mortality plunge by 40 per cent. Until now.
Now, the United Nations, aid agencies and humanitarian organisations are all sounding the alarm that progress is stalling, and in some cases reversing, across the world, including even in the UK.
