Officials of Quang Lam Commune Health Station check blood pressure of pregnant women.
Safe motherhood is one of the important contents of reproductive health care. The goal of Safe Motherhood is to improve the quality of health care for mothers and newborns to reduce the rate of obstetric complications, reduce maternal and newborn deaths. Therefore, the health education content on Safe Motherhood is always of interest to the World Health Organization and many countries to include in the Global Maternal and Child Health Care Strategy. Reducing maternal deaths, reducing child deaths, reducing child malnutrition are goals that reflect the development of medicine, as well as the State's attention and investment in the health sector.
In recent years, maternal, child and reproductive health care in Vietnam has seen many positive changes, which have been highly appreciated by the international community. The maternal mortality rate has decreased more than 5 times, from 233/100,000 live births in 1990 to over 44/100,000 in 2024, ranking 4th in Southeast Asia. The infant mortality rate has decreased from 44‰ to 11.6‰; and the mortality rate of children under 5 has decreased from 58‰ to 18.2‰.
In Cao Bang , in recent years, the health sector has maintained regular activities at all levels, including: counseling on reproductive health care, pregnancy management, regular pregnancy check-ups, home visits to pregnant women, and provision of reproductive health care services at all levels. Therefore, professional indicators have also increased significantly compared to 2021: Maternal mortality rate/100,000 live births in 2021 is 62.7‰, in 2024 is 40.2‰; Mortality rate of children under 1 year old in 2021 is 13.7‰, in 2024 is 12.5‰; The rate of children under 5 years old with underweight malnutrition in 2021 is 16.3%, in 2024 is 16.1%.
However, there are still significant disparities in maternal and child mortality between geographical regions, between socio-economic regions and between ethnic groups. The mortality rate in mountainous, remote and isolated areas is 2-3 times higher than in urban and delta areas. In particular, maternal mortality among Mong women is more than 7 times higher than that of Kinh and Tay ethnic groups (203/100,000 compared to 28.5/100,000 live births). Pre-, intra- and post-natal care has increased significantly, however, the rate of mothers receiving care in the first week after birth is only about 76% and is much lower in ethnic minority areas.
The main reasons come from limited access to pre-, during- and post-natal care services, especially in mountainous, remote, border and island areas; uneven service quality; outdated customs and practices in caring for and raising mothers, newborns and children still exist; the situation of pregnant women not going to the doctor, not managing their pregnancies, giving birth at home is still quite common in mountainous areas and ethnic minority areas. In addition, the team of medical staff working in maternal and child health care is still lacking in number and limited in expertise.
During Safe Motherhood Week, localities will mobilize all resources and organize many activities to raise community awareness and promote the participation and support of the whole society, especially the authorities at all levels, for maternal and child health care. Key activities include: training and capacity building for health workers; improving the quality of communication, counseling, reproductive health care services, essential care for mothers and newborns during and immediately after normal birth or cesarean section; encouraging exclusive breastfeeding in the first 6 months; promoting solutions to improve the quality of comprehensive postnatal care.
The launching of Safe Motherhood Week nationwide contributes to raising public awareness and mobilizing the attention and direction of authorities and organizations at all levels for maternal and child health care; increasing access to services, especially postnatal care, gradually improving the quality of health care services for mothers and newborns, reducing the disparity in health indicators, maternal and child mortality rates between regions, towards effectively implementing the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.
Plum Blossom
Source: https://soyte.caobang.gov.vn/tin-tuc-66446/tuan-le-lam-me-an-toan-nam-2025-voi-chu-de-cham-soc-sau-sinh-toan-dien-suc-khoe-cho-me-tuong-lai-1028249
Comment (0)