Health Equity and Black Women’s Birthing Experiences

Stop!

I can’t breathe.

Was I supposed to feel that?

What is going on?

Why has no one come to talk to me yet?

Is everything okay with my baby?

Why hasn’t my husband been allowed in?

I don’t want to have my water broken!  I want to birth naturally.  The baby will come when they are ready. 

These are just a few of the accounts of Black women’s birthing experiences from birth and reproductive justice researchers.  Did you know that Black women in the United States die at approximately 3-4 times the rate of White women during childbirth?  This rate is even higher in some of the nation’s biggest and wealthiest cities, like Chicago, where Black women die at rates as high as 6 times that of White women.  Some may assume that these of issues of the past and are only the concerns of countries in the developing world.  But they would be wrong.  Did you know of all the developed nations, such as Sweden, Japan, and Germany, which tend to have stronger economies, advanced technology, and higher standards of living, the United States is the most dangerous country to give birth in for a woman of any race, and it becomes significantly more dangerous for Black women?  In fact, over the last three decades, the United States is only 1 of 2 countries that saw significant increases in their maternal mortality rates for all women.  What is most jarring is that the Centers for Disease Prevention and Control reported in a 2022 report that 80% of these deaths are preventable.  We have the technology, and the highly qualified and trained medical professionals, and are considered one of the richest nations in the world.  So, why is this happening?

To answer this question, it is important to provide some historical context on how we got here in the first place.  Racism.  Slavery.  Greed.  This country was built on these three things.  Africans were stolen from their homes in various parts of Africa and taken to countries in the Caribbean and the Americas as part of the slave trade to work on plantations.  In 1808, the “Act Prohibiting the Importation of Slaves” took effect, banning the importation of slaves into the United States.  This ban led plantation owners to become solely dependent on the wombs of Black women to birth babies in order to maintain the US slavery system.  Within this system, Black women were only as valuable as their propensity to conceive and deliver healthy babies that would grow into the next generation of enslaved people. 

When thinking about the health disparities that Black women face today, especially those related to pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum, a direct link may be drawn from the antebellum slavery era and the ideologies about Black women that were birthed during this time.  In the United States, Black women are 3-5 times more likely to die during pregnancy, childbirth, or within one year of delivery due to pregnancy-related complications than White women.