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A critical review by the ministry of health of England and Wales of the report of a thousand maternal deaths
Abstract
Three hundred years ago, in 1660, from information supplied by Sir James Y. Simpson and E. V. Sieveking, the maternal mortality rate in London was about 1 in 40 births and one hundred years later only about half the figure. A century ago a distinct improvement had occurred, for only about 1 in 200 women died in childbirth in England and Wales, a rate in modem terminology of 5 per 1,000. We are about to consider a survey of the causes of over 1,000 maternal deaths when the rate over a period of 3 years was slightly over one-tenth of that figure.
