Challenge

In Mexico, maternal deaths have decreased by half in the last two decades. Despite important progress, maternal mortality rates in rural communities, where many people lack access to basic medical attention, are much higher than in urban settings. The quality of healthcare has a huge impact on whether a woman or girl will seek care, creating an urgent a need to understand quality from women’s and girls’ perspectives.

Solution

When women and girls are themselves involved in identifying the barriers and solutions to healthcare, progress accelerates. Women in Mexico identified their needs for quality healthcare in the What Women Want Now, CPMS Mexico is using women’s direct demands to achieve the change they want to see in their healthcare and rights.

Current Campaigns

The What Women Want campaign asked women and girls to set the agenda, as opposed to beginning with a premise of what is important or asking them to decide among a set of options. Building on the global What Women Want advocacy agenda, CPMS Mexico is developing an actionable advocacy agenda specific to the demands from Mexico to make women’s and girl’s demands a reality. The demands identified through the What Women Want campaign are further reinforced through the indirect effects and disproportionate burden of direct and indirect deaths on pregnant women. In a context where budgets for maternal and reproductive health are being reduced with little transparency, CPMS is working to ensure adequate national budget provision for RMNH services and to ensure consistent and evidence-based guidelines for respectful care across the country.

Our Impact

What Women Want

As part of the global campaign What Women Want: Demands for Quality Healthcare from Women and Girls, CPMS Mexico mobilized 133,427 women and girls to share their top priority for their own healthcare.  The top three demands were: medicines and supplies; information, personnel, services and supplies for antenatal care; and increased competent and better supported midwives and nurses.

Midwifery & Citizen Journalism 

With the support of the MacArthur Foundation, CPMS Mexico and White Ribbon Alliance came together with 21 partners from 2017 to 2018 to convene and advance midwifery efforts between Mexico stakeholders and global stakeholders. The partnership informed Mexico stakeholders on the latest evidence in Midwifery and Maternal Health, provided learning and sharing opportunities between Mexico stakeholders and WRA alliances, and amplified midwives’ stories through citizen journalist trainings. 20 midwives from seven different states were trained in a range of communication techniques, pairing them with professional journalists and equipping them to more effectively tell their personal stories and those of the women, families and communities in whom they serve.