Black women are four times more likely than white women to die giving birth. Fixing that requires change that goes way beyond healthcare
In 2018, we learned that Black women were five times more likely to die in childbirth than their white counterparts. Five years on, the data hasn’t changed much. Now, we are almost four times more likely to die, according to the findings of a new report by the women and equalities committee.
Ministers had failed to tackle “appalling” and “glaring” racial disparities in maternal health over a number of years, the authors found. This comes as little surprise to me. Every year, I and other Black commentators who feel passionately about these disgusting racial disparities in maternal outcomes are rolled out to condemn the latest figures that point to Black women dying at disproportionate rates. I wish I could still feel shocked. But, if I can be frank, I’m just bored.
Candice Brathwaite is a journalist and author of I Am Not Your Baby Mother, Sister Sista and Cuts Both Ways. As told to Lucy Pasha-Robinson
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