The odds of dying during childbirth are way higher than you think the usa today report explains over 50 000 women are severely injured during childbirth each year and about 700 die. In places such as the united states the united kingdom and canada most women have healthy pregnancies and births.

American Women Are Dying Unnecessarily In Childbirth How Can We

Black women have a much higher chance over 30 percent of dying due to pregnancy or labor complications but they aren t more likely to develop problems related to labor deaths.

Chance of dying during childbirth. Risk factors associated with increased maternal death include the age of the mother obesity before becoming pregnant other pre existing chronic medical conditions and cesarean delivery. In countries with a good economy modern technology and access to healthcare the chances of dying during pregnancy in childbirth or in the days and weeks after delivery are very low. The issue is that when a black woman develops preeclampsia or a hemorrhage her chances of surviving are lower than that of a white woman.

Black women are three to four times more likely to die from pregnancy related causes than white women according to the centers for disease control and prevention. It s partly why the overall rate of pregnancy related deaths has climbed over the past two decades. A pregnancy related death is defined as the death of a woman during pregnancy or within one year of the end of pregnancy from a pregnancy complication a chain of events initiated by pregnancy or the aggravation of an unrelated condition by the physiologic effects of pregnancy.