Looming Aid Cuts Will Harm Afghan Women’s Health

A doctor measures the blood pressure of a patient at the Kahdistan health clinic in Herat province, Afghanistan, on Oct. 7. The increasing presence of midwives across the country has started to play a role in improving a mother’s and baby’s chances of survival. Afghanistan’s maternal mortality rate has dropped from 1,300 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2002 to 638 deaths per 100,000 births in 2017. Lynzy Billing for Foreign Policy

HERAT, Afghanistan—On an October morning at the Kahdistan health clinic for internally displaced persons, the line of men, women, and children stretched around the street corner. Inside, the health care workers at the small clinic, run by Doctors Without Borders (MSF), prepared for the day ahead—working to provide vital services to as many women as possible.

Across Afghanistan, women have minimal access to reproductive health care and safe delivery services. For displaced women, the situation is more dire. More than 4 million people are displaced within the country, and thousands of citizens return every day from neighboring Pakistan and Iran, many by deportation. This influx threatens to push the country’s straining health care system to a breaking point, particularly in poorly equipped border regions such as Herat province.