Every day, women lose their lives during pregnancy and childbirth from conditions that doctors already know how to treat. Severe bleeding, infection, high blood pressure, unsafe abortion, and obstructed labour continue to claim mothers whose deaths could often be prevented with basic medication, trained staff, clean facilities, and timely medical care.
For many women, survival depends less on the seriousness of their condition and more on where they live. In well-resourced hospitals, medication for haemorrhage, antibiotics, blood transfusions, surgical care, and neonatal equipment are usually close at hand. In poorer communities, a woman may arrive at a hospital only to learn that her family must purchase the medication, gloves, needles, or fluids needed to save her. When families cannot pay, treatment may be delayed until it is too late.
Distance also creates danger. Some mothers travel for hours across damaged roads without reliable transport. Others walk to hospitals before labour begins because travelling after dark is unsafe. Once they arrive, they may find exhausted medical workers caring for several patients without electricity, running water, adequate equipment, or enough medication.
These deaths affect far more than individual women. When a mother dies, newborn babies lose their primary source of nutrition and care. Older children may leave school to support the household. Families can fall deeper into poverty, while communities lose workers, caregivers, teachers, and leaders. Maternal mortality is not only a medical issue. It reflects how societies value women and whether their lives are treated as worth protecting.
Angela Gorman confronts this reality in Womanslaughter: A Personal Journey Through the Tragedy of Maternal Mortality. Her life changed after she watched a television programme showing pregnant women dying in Chad from treatable conditions. As an experienced neonatal nurse, she recognised that medications and equipment commonly available in the United Kingdom could have saved many of those lives.
Rather than turning away, Angela acted. What began with one email developed into years of fundraising, humanitarian travel, medical support, professional training, and advocacy across several African countries. She entered overcrowded maternity wards, met dedicated doctors and midwives, witnessed preventable deaths, and saw how a small supply of medication could protect mothers and babies.
Her book is both a personal account and a challenge to the reader. It asks why preventable maternal deaths are still accepted and what can happen when one person refuses to remain silent.
Womanslaughter is a moving and urgent book for readers interested in nursing, women’s health, humanitarian work, social justice, and real stories of ordinary people creating meaningful change.
Find out in this essential read, available on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H8FKFQBZR
