U.S. Must Seize The Moment To Improve The Lives Of Mothers And Children Worldwide

''For too long, mothers and children have been neglected. We have before us a historic opportunity to correct that. Let's seize it!'' said Dr. Helene Gayle, president and CEO of CARE and co-chair of the CSIS Commission on Smart Global Health Policy. ''The solutions are within reach – vaccines for childhood diseases, expanded prenatal care and contraceptive access,skilled care at birth, better emergency services and post partum care. The world's mothers and children need better access to these life-saving, and cost-effective, interventions.''

The report recommends that direct U.S. investments are best focused on selected countries in Africa and South Asia – countries where the need is great, the partner government is genuinely engaged and the U.S. can make a significant contribution. At the same time, U.S. investments through other channels can reach a broader population in need.

As an organization that fights global poverty by empowering women and girls, CARE has made reducing maternal mortality one of its key priorities. Every year, more than half a million women die needlessly from complications of pregnancy and childbirth; 99 percent of these women live in the developing world. These deaths are a tragic loss of human life – and they have devastating consequences for families, communities and societies. Based on CARE's decades of experience working to improve women's health, we have come to realize that progress against poverty will be slowed as long as women are dying in their most productive years of life.

Improving maternal and child health is one of five key recommendations in the report, which calls on Washington policymakers to embrace a 15-year leadership plan for investing in global health. CARE also supports the other recommendations, which include:

• Building on U.S. achievements in HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria
• Expanding global preparedness to meet emerging health threats
• Strengthening partnerships with institutions capable of advancing global health

While deaths from AIDS and malaria have gone down, maternal care has been largely neglected in global health efforts. Improving maternal health is highlighted as one of the United Nation's key Millennium Development Goals for 2015, but scant progress has been made in the past two decades.

By adopting the recommendations in this report, the U.S. can save an estimated three million mothers each year from dying during pregnancy and birth; and over 2.6 million babies from perishing in their first month of life; and significantly reduce the more than two million deaths of children under age five caused by vaccine-preventable causes.

''There is great support in the U.S. and around the world for tackling the challenges of improving global health – especially for mothers and children – and we urge policy makers to embrace the recommendations in this report,'' added Dr. Gayle.

About CARE: Founded in 1945, CARE is a leading humanitarian organization fighting global poverty. CARE places special focus on working alongside poor women because, equipped with the proper resources, women have the power to help whole families and entire communities escape poverty. Women are at the heart of CARE's community-based efforts to improve education, health and economic opportunity.

About CSIS: The Center for Strategic and International Studies is a bipartisan, nonprofit organization founded in 1962 and headquartered in Washington, D.C. It seeks to advance global security and prosperity by providing strategic insights and policy solutions to decision makers.