Making maternal mortality a priority

Happy Friday. I hope you all had a lovely week. Let’s get to it:

“Sir, your wife just isn’t a priority right now.’”

That’s what Charles Johnson says a nurse told him when he asked why his wife, Kira Johnson, had not received a CT scan hours after experiencing a complication as a result of a scheduled cesarean section in 2016.

Later that night, in Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, she would die after experiencing severe internal bleeding. She was an active 39-year-old who ran marathons, raced cars and was a licensed pilot. (Tuesday, the Los Angeles Times reported that Cedars-Sinai is facing a federal investigation over its treatment of Black mothers.)

After Kira’s death, her husband decided to share the story to bring attention to the U.S.’ exceptionally high maternal mortality rate – which is even more dire for Black women like Kira.

“All of God’s children are precious, but Kira Johnson was a Black woman who flew airplanes and ran marathons,” Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.) tells Women Rule in an interview. “She had the income, she had the insurance, and she literally died in her hospital bed, hours after giving birth to a child, begging for care. And the data suggests that this is not an anomaly.”

“The way that I approach this work is with her energy and mind,” Charles Johnson tells me. “I know that she would not settle for anything other than complete accountability, complete transparency, not only for our family, but for other families as well.”

Charles Johnson has started a non-profit, 4Kira4Moms, aimed at reducing maternal mortality. He’s worked with members of Congress including Rep. Lauren Underwood (D-Ill.) to help shape some of the bills included in the Black Maternal Health Momnibus Act. One of those bills, the Kira Johnson Act, was reintroduced in the Senate this week by Warnock and Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.).

The bill would provide $100 million in funding per year for five years to community-based organizations offering programs and resources intended to improve maternal health outcomes for demographics with high maternal mortality rates. It also would provide a yearly $5 million in grants for five years to implement anti-bias training for employees in maternity health settings.

“I like the fact that this legislation provides resources to grassroots organizations that are on the ground already doing this work,” Warnock says. “They need our support.”

The U.S. has the highest pregnancy-related death rate among developed nations. And in 2021, the maternal mortality rate for Black women was 2.6 times higher than the rate for white women.

“Inexcusably in the United States, there are significant and persistent racial disparities that are impacting maternal health outcomes,” says Wanda Barfield, director of the Division of Reproductive Health at the CDC.

“Maternal health really matters not just for the health of the mother, which is critically important, but also for the health of the baby and for society as a whole.”

Experts point to a variety of reasons for the racial disparities – like the fact that “Black women are more likely to deliver in areas where the quality of care is lower,” says Barfield. But recently, they’ve also been pointing to implicit bias and systemic racism in the health care sector as likely playing a role – as did a United Nations Population Fund report on Black maternal mortality released this week which included the U.S in its analysis.

Southern states, like the one Warnock represents, generally have higher maternal mortality rates than the rest of the U.S. In 2021, the most recent year that data is available, Mississippi had the highest rate, at 82.5 deaths per 100,000 births. The second highest was New Mexico, with 79.5.

“New Mexico’s mothers and all mothers deserve better,” Rep. Leger Fernández (D-N.M.) tells Women Rule.

Fernández, along with the majority of the New Mexico congressional delegation, all Democrats, expressed support for the Momnibus bill. None of Mississippi’s delegation responded to a request for comment, though Sen. Bennie Thompson, the state’s lone Democrat, previously sponsored the legislation.

So while Southern states suffer the most, it’s unclear how supportive their largely Republican congresspeople will be of the Momnibus. The legislation was first introduced in 2020, but has struggled to muster enough support to make it through both chambers.

Warnock seems to be holding out hope.

“This is not a partisan issue,” he tells Women Rule. “The good news is that we can address this and I’m hopeful that we will get this done.”

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