In 2023, in the richest and most powerful nation on Earth, it shouldn’t be life-threatening to carry a child and give birth. Yet for years, mothers in these United States — Black mothers especially — have suffered from elevated mortality rates, rates that were only driven higher during COVID-19, as women of all ethnic backgrounds saw the sharpest-ever annual fatality spike.
New CDC numbers reveal that 1,205 women died of pregnancy-related causes in 2021, compared with 861 in 2020 and 754 in 2019. That represented a one-year jump of 38% and a two-year jump of 64%, to the highest maternal mortality rate on record since 1965. Egad. Much of the increase can be attributed to COVID-19; the virus was a contributing factor in at least 400 maternal deaths, according to the Government Accountability Office.
Though that particular public health emergency has since abated (though not disappeared), there are two emergencies inside it that remain.
