The MBRRACE report states that 229 women died during pregnancy or within six weeks of pregnancy in 2018–2020, a 19% increase over previous years if Covid deaths are excluded. It also details the care of 289 women who died during the same period within a year of being pregnant. The U.K. government has stated its intention to halve maternal mortality in England between 2010 and 2025, but the latest figures show that these rates are in fact rising.
The report says that women living in the poorest areas were more than twice as likely to die than women in the richest parts of Britain, and this disparity increased significantly in the years indicated.
Suicide was the leading cause of death, although previously the main cause of maternal death in Great Britain was cardiovascular disease.
Since 2017–2019, the number of suicides among pregnant and postpartum women has tripled.
The authors of the report suggest that the reasons for this increase are the lack of proper care for women and the anxieties they encounter in family life (including so-called “domestic violence”). For our part, we cannot help but note that the threat of suicide increases significantly after abortion. This influence continues over the years and can manifest itself in subsequent pregnancies; also, the UK is currently the leader in promoting “tele-abortion”.
*MBRRACE-UK: Mothers and Babies: Reducing Risk through Audits and Confidential Enquiries across the UK is a team of researchers and organizations dedicated to studying maternal and infant mortality. Team website: https://www.npeu.ox.ac.uk/mbrrace-uk