No hospital admission, pregnant woman dies. India recalls maternal mortality

Pregnant woman died in ambulance because no hospital admitted her. India recalls maternal mortality problem

By Newsroom Last updated Jun 10, 2020

No hospital accepted her and she died. Pregnant woman dramatic story recalls the maternal mortality issue in India. This was reduced drastically, but COVID-19 outbreak complicated every kind of medical treatment.

Maternal mortality, as you read above, is the key point. The Gautam Buddh Nagar administration reported that the superintendent of the Noida district hospital, India, was shunted out and there are now legal actions against a nurse and a ward staffer for the death of a pregnant woman. Other actions have been recommended against the erring officers and staffers of the other hospitals in which the woman tried to be admitted, according to the statement.

Maternal mortality in India: the dramatic story of Neelam

Neelam reached almost seven hospitals with the ambulance but no one admitted her and her child. She was 30 and has been accompanied by her husband with the ambulance and saw her and their child dying after a 13-hour hospital hunt. This fact shocked the entire country and Indian community of Noida, and it highlighted the issue of medical negligence and mortal maternity that is still present in India, although the incredible reduction of MMR in the last years.

Other hospitals reported lapses on this matter, among them the ESIC in Noida, the Government Institute of Medical Sciences (GIMS) in Greater Noida, and private hospitals Shivalik, Sharda, Fortis and Max in Ghaziabad, as reported in The Indian Express.

India, COVID-19 worsen the problem of medical negligence and maternal mortality

In 2018, Dr Poonam Khetrapal Singh, WHO Regional Director for South-East Asia, declared that India did a groundbreaking progress in recent years in reducing the maternal mortality ratio (MMR) by 77%, from 556 per 100,000 live births in 1990 to 130 per 100,000 live births in 2016. According to him, this data would put the country on track to achieve the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) target of an MMR below 70 by 2030.

However, Indian emergency and healthcare system efforts have been jeopardized by the arrival of COVID-19. The Indian Express, in another article, foresaw that the preparation fo India to COVID-19 response would allegedly put in crisis the public health emergency system and allegedly would increase maternal mortality.

The hope is that there will be an always continuing provision of essential health services in sexual, reproductive, maternal, new-born and child health (SRMNCAH), in order to maintain the trust in the health system. Even during a terrible pandemic like the coronavirus.