Let’s Reward the Use of Maternal Health Supplies

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By: Milka Dinev, LAC Forum Regional Advisor, Reproductive Health Supplies Coalition

As far as maternal health supplies go, it is easy for groups to forget the role of the three key life-saving commodities and therefore fail to prioritize their presence in health facilities 100% of the time. Arguably, services — with their immediate human element — make for better story-telling a lot of the time. And good storytelling is a mainstay of the marketing and publicity that surround award mechanisms. And by comparison, supplies often carry rather sterile connotations of warehouses, supply chains, and transportation… read more

The Myth of the Meager Maternal Health Market

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By: Deepti Tanuku, Program Director, USAID-Accelovate

When I first entered this line of work, I often heard one thing: the maternal health market is way too small to be sustainable, much less lucrative. Naturally, one can only expect market failure for maternal health drugs and, by extension, a chronic situation of limited access to lifesaving medicines among those most in need. However, I disagree…. read more

Changing Incentives: Creating a Market for High Quality Oxytocin

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By: Celina Schocken, Jhpiego; Courtney Chang, Jhpiego

Oxytocin is the first-line drug for the prevention and treatment of postpartum hemorrhage (PPH) and is widely available in developing countries. There is a large market for oxytocin and there are many manufacturers of the drug; however there are growing concerns that products are not in good condition when they are injected, either because of poor manufacturing or degradation along the supply chain… read more

Improving Access to Maternal Health Commodities Through a Systems Approach: Where Are We Now?

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By: Beth Yeager, Principal Technical Advisor, Management Sciences for Health & Chair, Maternal Health Supplies Caucus, Reproductive Health Supplies Coalition

Nearly three years ago, I blogged about a systems approach to improving access for a Maternal Health Task Force (MHTF) series on maternal health commodities. It was an exciting year for maternal health. The UN Commission on Life-Saving Commodities for Women and Children (UNCoLSC) had just released its report with 10 recommendations for improving access to 13 priority commodities that included 3 for maternal health: oxytocin, misoprostol and magnesium sulfate. Since then, great progress has been made in identifying the bottlenecks to access, raising awareness of the complexity of addressing these challenges and increasing global commitment to ending preventable maternal deaths as part of the post-2015 development agenda… read more

Making Connections: Ensuring Access to Reproductive and Maternal Health Supplies

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By: Shafia Rashid, Senior Program Officer, Global Advocacy, Family Care International

The past ten years have witnessed impressive gains in the availability and use of reproductive health supplies like condoms and oral contraceptives that allow men and women to safely and effectively prevent or space pregnancies. As a result of concerted efforts by many partners, contraceptive prevalence rates have risen over 60% in countries around the world.

These dramatic successes in improving access to reproductive health supplies can shed important lessons and guidance for those working to ensure that life-saving maternal health medicines — including, oxytocin, misoprostol and magnesium sulfate — are available to all women, when they need them and wherever they give birth. These medicines, which can save lives by preventing or treating the leading causes of maternal death, remain out of reach for many women, particularly for poor, rural, indigenous and other vulnerable women. Many countries lack clear, supportive policies and adequate budgets to make essential maternal health medicines widely available, or have weak supply chains and logistical systems. Inadequate regulatory capacity, poor quality of medicines and lack of information and guidance on correct use are other barriers to access. But new tools can help change this… read more

Call for Posts: How to Increase Access to Maternal and Reproductive Health Supplies

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By: Beth Yeager, Principal Technical Advisor, Management Sciences for Health & Chair, Maternal Health Supplies Caucus, Reproductive Health Supplies Coalition; Katie Millar, Technical Writer, Women and Health Initiative, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health; Milka Dinev, LAC Forum Regional Advisor, Reproductive Health Supplies Coalition

The Maternal Health Task Force (MHTF), the Reproductive Health Supplies Coalition (RHSC)/Maternal Health Supplies Caucus (MHS) and Family Care International (FCI) share the goal of increasing awareness of the key role that reliable access to quality maternal and reproductive health supplies plays in reducing maternal mortality. To this end, we’d like to invite you to contribute a post to our blog series, Increasing access to maternal and reproductive health supplies: Leveraging lessons learned in preventing maternal mortality… read more