Breakthroughs Blog: Maternal health

In this guest post, Sarah Alexander—director of external relations for the Global Alliance to Prevent Prematurity and Stillbirth (GAPPS)—writes about the groundswell of momentum surrounding maternal and child health and the role research and development (R&D) can play in helping more babies have a healthy start to life. You may have noticed maternal and child health has been garnering a lot of attention lately. At the Saving Every Woman Every Child Global Summit in Toronto last week, the focus was on ending preventable deaths of mothers and children under 5, and the government of Canada pledged $3.5 billion toward those efforts. The week prior marked the launch of the Every Newborn series in The Lancet, as well as the endorsement of the Every Newborn Action Plan by the World Health Assembly in Geneva. Later this month, the Partnership for Maternal, Newborn & Child Health’s Third Annual Partners’ Forum will be held in Johannesburg. All of these events are building on each other and creating a groundswell that will help forge a blueprint for the post-Millennium Development Goal era.The momentum these efforts have gained is impressive, and great strides have been made in saving the lives of mothers and babies around the world. As the global health community looks toward the next 15 years, we are encouraged that more and more plans are incorporating R&D as pillars of a maternal and newborn health agenda. A focus on R&D will allow researchers to look upstream and investigate new ways of preventing problems from occurring in the first place—exemplifying the maxim that prevention is better than cure.There has been a groundswell of momentum for maternal and child health. There are many opportunities for high-impact R&D as part of the agenda. Photo: PATH/Mike WangAt the GAPPS—an initiative of Seattle Children's—we understand and advocate for all the great work that is being done to treat newborns—especially in low-resource settings—to give them a better chance of survival. With our focus on preterm birth and stillbirth, we envision a scenario where instead of treating infants born prematurely or laying to rest nearly 3 million stillborn babies every year, we could instead identify issues in utero and develop therapies to prevent preterm birth, stillbirth, and other pregnancy complications before they occur.Babies born too soon can face lifelong health complications, including respiratory issues, vision and hearing loss, cerebral palsy, developmental delays, and more. Stillborn babies are often not acknowledged with birth or death certificates, or prioritized in health efforts. While it’s essential that known interventions are scaled up to help save the lives of mothers and newborns, we are glad to see a comprehensive R&D movement picking up steam.There are many opportunities for high-impact R&D in maternal and newborn health. For example, new technologies allow for increased biomarker discovery and therapeutics development, which could allow doctors to screen for and treat conditions in pregnant women and their babies before birth, helping more babies have a healthy start to life.With so much momentum building around maternal and child health, we’re glad to see R&D into prevention is being prioritized so that one day every birth can be a healthy birth.

In this regular feature on Breakthroughs, we highlight some of the most interesting reads in global health research from the past week. Kaitlin Christenson, director of the GHTC, summarizes news out of the World Health Assembly (WHA) impacting the global health research and development (R&D) community including debates on the post-Consultative Expert Working Group on Research and Development: Financing and Coordination and post-2015 development agenda, and themes related to regulatory system strengthening, access to essential medicines, and the value of R&D. Renate Baehr—executive director of Deutsche Stiftung Weltbevoelkerung—writes about the next rendition of the European & Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership and how its expansion will impact more lives in low- and middle-income countries. She discusses how the program has been broadened to include neglected tropical diseases and how African countries will now fully participate in the group’s governance and decision making. The Canadian government announced it would provide $12 million to Grand Challenges Canada to finance innovations to improve maternal and child health in the developing world. The funding will support 65 projects to be implemented across 25 low-and middle-income countries. The announcement came in advance of the Canadian Prime Minister’s global summit on maternal, newborn, and child health taking place in Toronto from May 28-30. Wired reports on the passage of a resolution at WHA to create a global action plan to tackle the emerging problem of antibiotic resistance that will include exploring technology innovations in diagnostic testing and new drug development. The article notes that some experts believe this will not do enough to stem the problem and are calling for the creation of an intergovernmental body on antibiotic resistance that would be similar to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

In this guest post, Rachel Wilson—senior director of Policy and Advocacy at PATH—writes about a new report focused on health innovations for women and children worldwide. The report was released this week at the United Nations General Assembly in New York. This post originally appeared on the PATH blog. This week, PATH, along with partners including the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the MDG Health Alliance, and the United Nations Foundation, is releasing a report called Breakthrough Innovations That Can Save Women and Children Now. The publication introduces ten innovations—from products to systems approaches—that could have immediate impact in saving lives. Each is low-cost, effective, and sustainable. If we made a majority of these innovations widely available now, they could save more than 1.2 million women, newborns, and children by the end of 2015. Pair them with other interventions currently available and in development, and we have the power to save millions more lives. Blessing Kingsley holds her four-day-old daughter, Great. Photo: PATH/Evelyn Hockstein. Three ways to save moms and babies For example, magnesium sulfate is the most effective drug to prevent and treat life-threatening pregnancy complications caused by high blood pressure. Simplifying dosing and improving modes of administration would give more poor women access to this lifesaving drug. Similarly, ROTAVAC® is a new vaccine that protects children from the leading cause of deadly diarrhea. If widely available, the vaccine could save thousands of children each year—at the cost of only US$1 a dose. And a program called Helping Babies Breathe uses innovative teaching tools to train health care workers and birth attendants how to resuscitate infants. In Tanzania, the initiative has reduced newborn mortality by as much as 47 percent. Help us get the message out But bright ideas and innovative technologies alone won’t save lives. This week, PATH’s leaders are at the UN General Assembly along with other key global health innovators and policymakers. We’re committed to gathering support so we can deliver solutions to the world’s women and children—and at the same time deliver on the promise of the Millennium Development Goals. At PATH, we’re transforming health through innovations like these. We can achieve a lasting impact only with the support of world leaders—and to get that, we need your support. Help us send the message that we can save women and children with innovations available right now. Join the conversation with @PATHadvocacy and @PATHtweets on Twitter and follow PATH on Facebook as we engage in the #innovations2015 conversation this week. More information See our report, Breakthrough Innovations That Can Save Women and Children Now. Learn more from the UN about the Millennium Development Goals.

Janna Oberdorf, Director of Communications and Outreach for Women Deliver, writes about the recent “Women Deliver 50” initiative to mark International Women’s Day. Earlier this week, Women Deliver released its “Women Deliver 50,” a list of 50 inspiring ideas and solutions delivering for girls and women around the globe. Launched in celebration of International Women’s Day, this list showcases game-changing innovations and technologies that are making advances for girls and women worldwide. Several of the innovations include health technologies that harness research and development (R&D) to develop and deliver woman-centered prevention and treatment options. Selected from hundreds of nominations from 103 countries, some of the “Women Deliver 50” winners impact the lives of girls and women on a global scale by improving access to health technologies. For example, the GAVI Alliance is working to reduce the cost of HPV vaccines and to support their broad introduction in many of the world’s poorest countries. More than 85 percent of the 275,000 women who die every year from cervical cancer live in developing countries. Through its efforts, GAVI is aiming for millions of girls worldwide to receive the HPV vaccine, providing them with a better chance at a healthy and productive life. The “Women Deliver 50" list showcases game-changing innovations and technologies that are making advances for girls and women worldwide. Photo credit: PATH There are also medical technologies that, through R&D, are evolving to better meet the needs of girls and women. Female condoms have been around for 20 years, but even when available, women often decide not to use them because of cost and design concerns. With this in mind, PATH solicited input from couples around the world, and designed a more affordable, easy-to-use and comfortable female condom. With this new product, PATH is helping women to better protect themselves from HIV infection and unintended pregnancies. An innovative organization working to accelerate R&D for female-initiated solutions for HIV prevention is the International Partnership for Microbicides, a “Women Deliver 50” finalist. Vaginal rings, a popular method for delivering contraceptives, are long-acting, discreet, and easy to use. IPM has adapted this technology to the fight against HIV, and is preparing to launch a licensure program in partnership with the Microbicide Trials Network to determine whether a vaginal ring containing antiretroviral drugs can safely and effectively provide women with monthly protection against HIV. Should it be successful, the ring would empower women with the tools they need to protect their health. The “Women Deliver 50” winners demonstrate that we can develop revolutionary tools that impact the health and livelihoods of girls and women worldwide. We need to continue to create, test, and scale-up new and existing technologies. We still don’t have all the vaccines, drugs, devices and other health technologies that girls and women need, and it is critical for us to bridge this gap. As we’ve seen time and time again, when we invest in health innovations for girls and women, we see a positive ripple effect across society. If you weren’t one of the 6,000 people who voted for these 50 solutions, you can still weigh in with your thoughts. Visit the Women Deliver website to learn more about these exciting interventions, as well as other ideas and solutions making a difference around the world. And then visit Women Deliver on Facebook and Twitter to tell us what you think.