| | |  Health & Beauty | May 2009 
International Women's Health Day 2009
 Presidencia de la República
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| | President Calderón leads presentation of National Strategy to Reduce Maternal Mortality. | |
Mexico City - As part of International Women’s Health Day, President Felipe Calderón confirmed his government's commitment to women's welfare and progress and led the presentation of the National Strategy for Reducing Maternal Mortality, designed to provide universal attention for pregnancy complications and promote a culture of risk prevention and self-care among pregnant women.
Accompanied by his wife Margarita Zavala, he announced that as from today, the IMSS, ISSSTE, and Health Secretariat will provide free treatment for any woman, regardless of whether she is affiliated to these organizations, who suffers complications during pregnancy.
This places Mexico on the right track to improving the quality of life of pregnant women and achieving the goal of maternal maternity to which Mexico is committed through the United Nations Organization. Federal Government, said President Calderón, thereby confirms its commitment to women's health and that of their children.
At the esplanade to the Health Secretariat, at an event at which the heads of the SSA, José Ángel Córdova Villalobos; IMSS, Daniel Karam Toumeh, and ISSSTE, Miguel Ángel Yunes Linares, signed the Inter-Institutional Agreement for the Universal Care of Obstetric Emergencies, President Calderón said that the National Strategy is a joint response to ensure timely medical care for pregnant women.
He said that maternal mortality is a preventable tragedy that has immediate effects not only on the family but also in the medium and long term, since a mother's absence exposes children and young people to greater risks: abandonment, violence, addictions and dropping out of school.
The President recalled:
“Mexico is one of the countries that pledged to the United Nations Organization to reduce maternal mortality by 75%; this is the challenge we have set ourselves. Specifically, as part of the Millennium Goals, it accepted the challenge to reduce this mortality rate from 89 deaths for every live births in 1990 to not more than 22 for every thousand live births in the year 2015, i.e. from nearly 90 to 22.
He explained that in order to reduce maternal mortality more quickly, the Health Pregnancy Program was launched in 2008 and reported that by the end of last year, this rate had fallen to 54 maternal deaths for every thousand live births. “This means that in 18 years, we have achieved half our goal,” he said.
Accompanied by Rocío García Gaytán and Ernesto Cordero Arroyo, President of the National Institute of Women and Secretary of SEDESOL, he said that although the results are encouraging, changes must be achieved more quickly, since 2,100,000 expectant mothers have been reported, of which nearly 250,000 are experiencing complications.
These difficulties, said President Calderón, produce 1,100 maternal deaths and side effects in 30,000 women. Eighty per cent of these deaths could have been prevented with timely medical care and proper facilities and equipment.
“As a society, we cannot allow this public health problem to continue harming our families. Coping with and overcoming it requires the coordinated work of all: the National Health System and the unity of all Mexicans."
That is why, he said, an alliance has been promoted with sectors of society to ensure Mexican women's right to healthy motherhood. |
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