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Temie Giwa-Tubosun was a graduate student in California doing an internship in global health when she witnessed a mother’s death. Arriving at a village in Northern Nigeria, she met Aisha, nine months pregnant and in labor, suffering terribly, her labor failing to progress. Family members and neighbors had gathered around, but all anyone could do was stand by and watch her die. Temie could not help but think about Aisha during the birth of her son six years later in Minnesota. She survived her own life-threatening complications and traces her commitment to making a difference to that day — the moment she says she became “obsessed” with maternal health and vowed to dedicate her career to helping prevent women from dying of childbirth-related complications.

By 2016, Temie was running her own business: a mission-driven startup based in Nigeria that provides health care workers with access to a reliable supply of blood to treat postpartum hemorrhage — excessive bleeding after delivery and the leading cause of maternal deaths globally — and other emergencies. Three years since launch, LifeBank has helped over 6,700 women and counting.

Preventable maternal deaths still occur in alarming numbers — over 800 women a day — and it is not just a global health issue, it is a local issue. In the U.S., the rate has actually risen, with Black women three to four times more likely to die.

To address this crisis, women have been leading the charge. It’s the everyday heroism from nurses, midwives, community health workers, doulas — most of whom are women — supporting women through their pregnancy and childbirth journeys. And it’s innovators like Temie who are stepping up to create new solutions, organizations and coalitions that are filling in the gaps.

Through Merck for Mothers, Merck’s $500 million initiative to help end preventable maternal deaths, we’re focused on supporting these efforts — often led by women — and building on them, to help create a world where no woman has to die giving life.

We take a “glocal” (global and local) approach to this issue. Most recently, we announced plans to support promising health innovators in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. The new MOMs (Maternal Outcomes Matter) Initiative will include LifeBank as its first investment to help Temie scale her operation across Nigeria and beyond.

Here in the U.S. we also recently announced the first round of Safer Childbirth Cities, an initiative that is nurturing grassroots innovators — nearly all women and a majority women of color — and providing resources so that they can make their cities safer, and more equitable, places to give birth. The leaders of these 10 city-based coalitions, like Jessica Roach in Columbus, Ohio, who helms ROOTT, have deep connections with their communities and know how to make change to improve the lives of women and their families. Recognizing a need for better support around pregnancy and childbirth, ROOTT provides doula care for Black women who have limited or no access to health insurance to help ensure that they receive relevant, consistent, safe and equitable care.

When I joined Merck for Mothers in 2017, the initiative was already moving the needle on maternal mortality, and gaining momentum by strengthening health systems, a pillar of Merck’s social business innovation strategy. These efforts in the U.S. helped create the data needed to better understand why maternal deaths were happening and catalyze advocacy and action so we can prevent them from happening again.

Through all of this we’ve learned that leadership matters and women’s leadership matters even more. Lifting up women leaders on the frontlines is making the difference. We’ve also learned that support can, and should, come in many shapes and forms. For the impact of women’s leadership to be transformative and sustained we need to do more than just provide funding. To ensure that we are doing more, we ask ourselves the following questions:

1. Are we facilitating working in silos or collaborating?

Ending preventable maternal mortality requires a diverse range of experiences, perspectives and skill sets, united behind a shared mission. We work to catalyze new “business as unusual” partnerships and link women leaders to networks, platforms and coalitions that will continue to elevate and fuel their efforts.

2. Are we advancing solutions that integrate women’s experiences at the core?

We work to ensure that we are not just listening to women but creating and institutionalizing pathways and opportunities for women’s full inclusion in designing, implementing and leading the change needed to improve maternal health outcomes.

3. Are we creating the right incentives to drive innovation and entrepreneurship?

We work to advance an enabling environment for innovative solutions to develop, grow and sustain — whether it be businesses like LifeBank or reproductive justice organizations like ROOTT.

In the fight to make pregnancy and childbirth safer, we are just scratching the surface when it comes to maximizing the contributions of women at the frontlines, but the momentum is building. Join us.

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Dr. Mary-Ann Etiebet is Lead and Executive Director of Merck for Mothers, Merck’s $500 million initiative to help create a world where no woman has to die giving life. Merck for Mothers is known as MSD for Mothers outside the United States and Canada.

Dr. Mary-Ann Etiebet

Writing since February 2022 · 1 story contributed