Rural America Has a Maternal Mortality Problem. Midwives Might Help Solve It.

August 19, 2019

(Pew Research) – Hospitals and obstetrics units are shutting down across rural America, creating a shortage of care that may be contributing to the country’s rising maternal mortality rate. The United States’ maternal mortality rate is higher than in Canada, Japan, or any Western European country — even higher than the rate in Saudi Arabia and Kazakhstan. And the mortality rate in rural areas tends to be higher than it is in cities and suburbs. Between 2011 and 2015, it was 23.3 deaths per 100,000 births in Tennessee and 19.4 in Kentucky.