Safe Motherhood

World Population Foundation (WPF) is running an advocacy campaign on Safe Motherhood which was launched on International Mother’s Day 2008 under the banner of “Saving the Soul Bearers” to spread awareness about maternal mortality in Pakistan.

Why Safe Motherhood?

• Healthy Pregnancy is pre-requisite for the sustainable human development and to have a safe and healthy pregnancy, it is important to promote the concept of Safe Motherhood.
• Complications associated with pregnancy and childbirth are the leading causes of death and disability among women of reproductive age in developing countries.
• WPF is celebrating Mothers’ Night in ten different countries of the world including Pakistan.

Goals

• To advocate for the Safe Motherhood through awareness raising campaign at different levels to get needed momentum so the issue could become high on everybody’s agenda at political, policy, programmatic & partners’ levels

Objectives

• To create interest among Stakeholders and ensure the concept of joint responsibility
• To raise awareness around the theme of Safe Motherhood through electronic and print media
• To draw attention of Policy Makers and relevant Government Departments for their commitments towards the issue of Maternal Mortality

Global Commitments

• The government of Pakistan has ratified an international agreement; The Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women that includes a legally binding commitment to provide the health and social services to pregnant women.
• Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 5 and 3 also reinforce to reduce maternal deaths and provide universal access to reproductive health care. MDG Goals
• According to UNICEF’s latest report “The State of the World’s Children 2009”, 1 in every 89 Pakistani women will die of childbirth related causes compared to 1 in 8000 in the developed world.