Our Progress in India, Senegal, Uganda, the U.S., and Zambia:
Every two minutes, a woman dies from complications related to pregnancy and childbirth. That's nearly 800 women a day, the vast majority of them in developing countries.
Most of these deaths are preventable.
With the right tools and resources, conditions like severe bleeding (obstetric hemorrhage) and pregnancy-induced high blood pressure (preeclampsia/eclampsia) become treatable complications – not death sentences.
Women are the cornerstone of a healthy and prosperous world. When a mother survives pregnancy and childbirth, her family, community, and nation thrive.
It's a Global Issue
Safe and healthy motherhood touches us all, whether we live in the Great Lakes of East Africa or the Great Lakes of the U.S. Even in the most medically advanced nations, too many women die in pregnancy and childbirth. The disparities in maternal mortality between countries in the developed world and the developing world, however, are grave. 99% of all maternal deaths occur in developing countries, 66% in sub-Saharan Africa and 22% in South Asia.
When a woman dies, the effects on her family are enormous: her baby is more likely to die before the age of two and her other children are up to 10 times more likely to leave school, suffer from poor health, or die prematurely. Families experiencing a maternal death spend more on funeral expenses than all other yearly expenses combined, including food, shelter, and education. But it's not just her family that suffers.
A woman's death also impairs her community. Her unpaid work contributes to economic life, accounting for as much as one-third of the world's gross national product. Women are also more likely to reinvest their earned income in essential family needs like food, education, and medicine.
Can you imagine a world where no mother dies giving birth? We can. That's the promise of Merck for Mothers. Working together with committed partners, we believe we can help make pregnancy and childbirth a safe, healthy, and joyful experience for women.
We are working to improve maternal health through innovative partnerships and programs in more than 30 countries, including India, Senegal, Uganda, the U.S., and Zambia.
Merck for Mothers, known as MSD for Mothers outside of the United States and Canada, is a 10-year $500 million initiative focused on improving the health and well-being of mothers during pregnancy and childbirth.
As a global healthcare company, Merck created Merck for Mothers to address this critically important issue. We are committed to using our business and scientific expertise to end preventable maternal mortality and are already working in more than 30 countries around the world.
Working closely with our program leadership, advisory board, governments, international organizations, health experts, and those on the front lines, we are helping women across the world be well.
New research from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine reveals that a considerable proportion of women seek maternal care from private health providers. Often overlooked, private doctors, nurses and midwives provide about 40% of antenatal care, delivery care and family planning services. We are committed to helping ensure that women have access to affordable, high quality services wherever they seek care.
There are many ways to get involved in the fight against maternal mortality. Learn more.
Check Out the Recent Post from Naveen Rao, Lead, Merck for Mothers
This two-year project is developing a policy toolkit on maternal mortality in Latin America and the Caribbean to inform the work of key stakeholders and foster greater collaboration on maternal health issues in the region. The initial research phase of the project enabled the Foundation to identify pilot projects in Mexico, Colombia, and Argentina to implement the policy toolkit and best practices.
This one-year program supported seven medical missions to train local health workers on maternal health and safe motherhood practices to help reduce maternal mortality. The program provided medical supplies to facilities where trainees practiced, where more than 290 obstetric consultations and 100 deliveries were conducted.
This three-year project seeks to reduce maternal mortality in the Mont-Ngafula and Selembao regions by increasing the number of antenatal visits, improving the quality of antenatal care, and enhancing the ability of health workers to manage complications during pregnancy and childbirth. The program is also supporting adolescents by conducting prenatal consultations through a school-based health program.
This three-year project aims to reduce maternal mortality and morbidity in the most vulnerable municipalities of Bolivar, Colombia by improving the delivery of quality maternity care before, during, and after pregnancy. The program is assessing community needs around maternal health to inform the technical support and training needed to enhance maternal healthcare services.
The MiMi-Initiative for Maternal Health project aims to reduce barriers to maternal healthcare for female migrants in Germany. This will be achieved through the development, implementation, and promotion of appropriate measures and communication of information among female migrants and experts in maternal healthcare in Germany.
This two-year initiative is implementing “mHealth for Maternal Health” in five districts of West Wollega, Ethiopia in collaboration with the University of Copenhagen. The project has two modules: 1) a system to enhance antenatal care, skilled birth attendance, timely referrals, and community awareness by linking pregnant women to the health system; and 2) a smart-phone tool to enhance the quality of emergency obstetric care by enabling birth attendants to better recognize and manage obstetric complications.
This two-year project is working to reduce maternal and newborn mortality in rural Ethiopia through an overall health system strengthening approach to ensure greater access to assisted delivery and neonatal care for women and newborns. This program is focusing on strengthening the referral network in cases of obstetric emergencies while also increasing demand for facility births through community outreach.
This two-year project worked with foster care organizations in Finland to promote the sexual health of young girls living within these institutions. The program advanced the sexual health of young people living in foster care to help prevent sexual violence, improve life management skills in adolescence, and decrease the risk of social isolation among adolescents.
This two-year project implemented the campaign, “As Soon As You’re Pregnant,” across select areas of the United Kingdom. The campaign is working to reduce health inequalities among pregnant women in London by helping ensure that women access their health and social care assessments early in their pregnancy. The campaign is a mass communications effort with information broadcast across radio, TV, and social media.
This three-year project is working to increase access to family planning, promote safe birth practices, and reduce anemia among female factory workers in Indonesia. Specifically, they are working to connect women with affordable, quality health services within the factories and establishing linkages to external health services. Six factories have been recruited for the program with a catchment of more than 12,000 female factory workers.
MSD for Mothers programs in India are exploring the potential of local private providers and health businesses to improve private maternal health services.
This one-year project is working to reduce maternal mortality and morbidity among adolescents in rural Jamaica. Specifically, Trained Youth Health Aides (YHAs) conduct peer-to-peer outreach and educational campaigns to raise awareness of critical maternal and reproductive health issues among young people. 
This two-year project is strengthening midwifery education to improve health outcomes for women and newborns in Myanmar. The program is working with midwifery tutors in Kayin state to conduct a needs assessment and design clinical courses to address these gaps during trainings and follow-up (including infrastructure, knowledge, and skills performance).
This three-year project is improving reproductive and maternal health knowledge among adolescents and women over 35 years of age through integrated community interventions, including training and counseling by Adolescent Health Promoters, Obstetric Godmothers, and Mobile Medical Units. Working with a catchment population of 10,000 families, the training aims to reduce maternal mortality among these target age groups.
This three-year project is helping integrate HIV/AIDS care with antenatal services at 11 health facilities by training more than 300 health workers to provide antenatal care and delivery services, as well as services to prevent maternal-child transmission of HIV.
This three-year project is working to address postpartum hemorrhage (PPH) and preeclampsia/eclampsia in three states - Sokoto, Kebbi, and Zamfara - by advocating for improved quality of maternal healthcare and building the capacity of the government and service providers to support quality improvements. The program is also improving access to quality care at the community level by training Community Health Extension Workers (CHEWs), and by expanding access to misoprostol to treat PPH within rural communities. 
This three-year project is working to reduce maternal mortality in Samar province by promoting health seeking behaviors and strengthening local healthcare systems (including infrastructure, leadership, and programming). In collaboration with the government, the project is mobilizing the 20 municipalities to reform and strengthen healthcare systems, access government financial and non-financial resources, develop technical skills of health providers on antenatal and obstetric care, and disseminate information to influence health seeking behaviors in the community. 
This three-year project is rolling out an e-learning course to help community workers and midwives better manage reproductive and maternal health needs and increase antenatal visits in Rwanda.
This one-year project empowered women in areas affected by the earthquake in October 2011 by raising awareness about safe motherhood among health workers and local leaders. The project conducted trainings for providers and community health workers, and operated a home-visiting program to help women navigate the local health system. For many, counseling and information provided during the home visits persuaded them to formally register with the health system and access prenatal care at a healthcare facility for the first time. 
This three-year project is working to improve maternal health by developing an e-learning platform to support the delivery of comprehensive emergency obstetric care (CEmOC) in rural and remote health facilities in Kigoma, Morogoro, and Pwani. World Lung Foundation is working with 15 health facilities to train Assistant Medical Officers (AMOs) to provide CEmOC, including surgery, and ensuring that nurse-midwives/clinical officers are sufficiently trained to provide anesthesia. The project is also providing enhanced communications tools to support community healthcare workers in their daily work.
This three-year project is improving access to HIV/AIDS care for pregnant women, their partners, and their children in Kilombero district by developing a "one-stop" clinic; strengthening the referral system; and providing continuous provider training and education.
The MSD for Ugandan Mothers Program (MUM) is exploring the ability of local private providers and health businesses to improve maternal healthcare in more than 30 districts.
Merck for Mothers' programs are working to improve maternal health across the U.S. with a focus on regions where rates of maternal death and "near misses" are especially high.
This three-year project is improving the quality of obstetric care through the development of standardized guidelines to help health providers better manage postpartum hemorrhage (excessive bleeding), one of the leading causes of maternal mortality. In partnership with Harvard Medical School, the program is developing an instructional and simulated course to improve the clinical management of postpartum hemorrhage. 
This two-year project is enhancing an e-health platform, “SOS Telemedicine for Venezuela,” and building the capacity of health professionals in rural regions through videoconferences, instructional videos, and distance learning modules on maternal health. The goal of the platform is to increase the capacity of the health centers while raising awareness of maternal mortality within rural communities.
This two-year project is improving access to maternal health interventions by strengthening the capacity of national and provincial governments, as well as primary healthcare outreach teams, to support high-quality maternal and child health services. The project also seeks to pilot community feedback mechanisms, including mHealth technologies that can facilitate the monitoring of community-based health services.
MSD for Mothers' programs in Zambia are developing new models for maternity homes to improve access to facility delivery.