Maternal mortality remains high, experts say

The issue of maternal mortality remains a source of concern in Uzbekistan. "There has been a slight decrease in maternal mortality over recent years, but it remains high," Klara Yadgarova, the deputy head of the mother and child health department at the health ministry, told IRIN from the capital, Tashkent. She said that in 2002 there were 32 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births, a drop from 34 one year earlier. However, Uzbekistan, like other Central Asian countries, has maintained the former Soviet definition of live birth, which is considerably looser than the global definition provided by the World Health Organisation (WHO). Since child mortality is calculated as a percentage of live births, it remains conceivable that child mortality rates in the region's most populous nation would be significantly higher if the international definition were used. Meanwhile, the Asian Development Bank is providing Uzbekistan with technical assistance for a health development project for women and children. "One of the health sector goals of Uzbekistan is to achieve the millennium development goal of reduced infant and maternal mortality," Laura Shamsutdinova, the bank's project analyst, told IRIN from the Uzbek capital, Tashkent, adding that the project aimed to support the government’s reform strategy for woman-and-child health, coupled with improving the equity in access to quality and cost-effective maternal and child health services. Shamsutdinova also said that on the health service delivery level, the project would support Uzbekistan's Primary Health-Care programme, facilitate the existing rural doctoral points model, and assist the government to develop and implement a district-level model to strengthen referral links for woman-and-child health care in some provinces with a strong focus on rural communities and poverty.