Black Maternity Care in the United States
Let's talk maternal health, a subject that is deeply important to us at The Insurance People!
Maternal health has come a long way in the United States, but there is still a long way to go. One glaring point of inequity that remains to this day is the maternal mortality rate of Black women compared to that of other women in the US. This Black History Month, we want to highlight the healthcare issues facing Black American mothers and the strides being made to close this gap.
In the early years up through the 19th Century in the U.S., midwifery was the most common approach to prenatal care and childbirth. This practice also applied to Black women in the U.S., as many enslaved Black women were made to work as midwives in the South. This began to change in the early 1800s, however, as White physicians began to take an interest in childbirth as a medical field. They resisted midwife-assisted births, and many of their medical breakthroughs came through their experiments on enslaved Black women. The field of modern Gynecology and much of its advancements, including the cesarean section and modern design of the speculum, are inextricable from slavery. The experimentation done on enslaved Black women to develop these techniques was unethical, painful, and often resulted in the women’s sterilization or death.
The dangerous and exploitative use of Black women’s bodies is still felt in modern medical relations and statistics. There is a lot of medical mistrust among the Black community, according to the Commonwealth Fund Organization, due to the long history of mistreatment at the hands of medical providers. The impact of racism in the healthcare system has created a large and dangerous gap for Black expecting mothers. The CDC reports that Black women are three times more likely to die from pregnancy-related issues compared to their white counterparts. Black women also have a 14% percent chance of premature birth, compared to the 9% chance of White women, according to a 2019 study published by the CDC.
The fight for reproductive rights is felt especially hard amongst Black women, as the freedom to choose where and how one receives maternal care has been denied to them for so long. However, efforts are being made to address this healthcare inequality. The Black Maternal Health Caucus was launched in 2019 by Congresswoman Lauren Underwood and Congresswoman Alma Adams. This Caucus serves to advance policies through Congress that address the disparity of Black maternal health in the United States. In 2021, the Black Midwifery Collective was formed to provide community-led support for Black expecting mothers by advocating for and training midwives within the Black community.
In spite of a history rife with pain and medical racism, and a political climate bent on impeding reproductive rights, the movement to advance the rights of Black mothers is full of hope for the future. “Look, the problem’s only gotten worse—with one in three women now living in states with abortion bans, and one in two for Black women. However, I can tell you that the interest remains high, and we are doing the work,” Congresswoman Lauren Underwood says. “We are building coalition partnerships with advocates around the country, localizing this for people. Educating and encouraging folks to be part of the solution … so that’s why I’m optimistic.”
