(20-12-07) Obesity 'fuels rise in maternity deaths'

By Lucy Cockcroft


The number of maternity deaths in Britain has risen in the past three years, figures are expected to reveal.

Increasing levels of obesity and an influx of immigrant mothers who fail to attend antenatal appointments are behind the trend, it is claimed.

A report, due to be published on Dec 4, is understood to have found that more mothers died during childbirth in 2003-05 than in 2000-02, when the figure was 261.

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Factors leading to the increase include record rates of obesity among pregnant women and the trend to have babies later in life, both of which create more risks.

A rise in the number of immigrant women having children in Britain may also influence the increase. They are more likely to have health problems that lead to complications in childbirth, and are less likely to attend antenatal appointments.

The figures, compiled by the Confidential Enquiry into Maternal and Child Health, an independent body managed by eight Royal Medical Colleges, are also expected to be higher as they include the deaths of 10 mothers at Northwick Park Hospital between 2002 and 2005. The maternal mortality rate for the unit in west London, which was reprimanded by the Healthcare Commission for a series of failings, was 74.2 per 100,000, during this period ? more than six times the national average of 11.4.

Some medical staff and patient groups also fear that the NHS policy of encouraging "natural" birth without medical assistance is putting women at increased risk.

Professor James Dornan, the director of foetal medicine at the Royal Maternity hospital in Belfast, said: "Nature dictates that one in every 100 women will die having a baby. The mortality rate in parts of Africa is now about 850 to 1,000 per 100,000.

"I believe in women having choice but it has got to be informed choice."

However, a spokesman for the Department of Health said it did not believe that figures would show an increase in mortality rates and Britain was one of the safest places to have a baby.

She said: "Safety is the NHS's top priority. The UK is one of the safest places in the world to have a baby but we are always striving to be safer."


Source: Uk News

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