U.N. report highlights innovations aimed at improving maternal and child health

PBS NewsHour's blog "The Rundown" examines a "report from the U.N.'s Every Woman, Every Child Innovation Working Group, out in the Lancet Monday, [which] looks at some of the promising and innovative projects" aimed at improving maternal and child health. "More than 350,000 women die each year around the globe from complications of childbirth, and three million children die in the first month of life," according to the blog (Miller, 9/12). The report "was prepared as part of U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's 'Every Woman Every Child' Initiative, a global strategy for improving women and children's health, launched last year," according to a U.N. Foundation press release (9/12).

The blog highlights "five interesting approaches that could be models for other countries struggling with high maternal and infant mortality," including ColaLife's self-contained "aid pods" in Zambia; HERproject, which trains and educates women in Bangladesh, China, Egypt, India, Mexico, Pakistan and Vietnam; Cell-Life's text message reminder program for HIV-positive mothers in South Africa; LifeSpring's chain of hospitals for women in India, which offers affordable maternal care packages; and SMS for Life, which aims to monitor malaria medication stocks in Tanzania (9/12).