Expanding the respectful maternity care agenda to newborns: ethics and politics

Did we forget newborns in the global focus on maternal health? In this breakfast seminar, Dr Emma Sacks (John Hopkins University) will discuss why mistreatment of newborns is a critical issue, unpack the ethics of competing priorities in global health, and present options for policy responses.

Mother holding baby

Illustration picture, Riccardo Gangale/USAID Kenya via Flickr

The respectful maternity care agenda has grown considerably in the last decade, with increased attention, research and policy initiatives. The resulting focus on the childbirth period has facilitated advocacy, but aspects such as quality of care and respectful care for newborns in the postnatal period have too often been ignored.

Dr Emma Sacks, John Hopkins University

Particularly in low and middle income countries, where low utilisation of obstetric and neonatal services is of concern, poor quality of care or mistreatment of newborns or stillborn infants will likely influence future care seeking.

This session will discuss some of the political and ethical tensions related to the rights of newborns raised by this research, including legislative vs. structural public health responses to incidents of mistreatment, hierarchies of advocacies, and some potential ways forward.

On the seminar series "Global Health Unpacked"

“Global Health Unpacked” is a seminar series that aims to bring together the global health community on a regular basis to critically discuss key debates in Global Health in informal and interactive seminars. Guest speakers (both from the University of Oslo and from other universities) will bring an original perspective to the topic and engage in a conversation with the audience.

With this forum, we also hope to facilitate exchanges and collaborations between global health researchers and students present in Oslo and foster interdisciplinary research. “Global Health Unpacked” is jointly organized by the research group Power and Politics of Global Health, Centre for Development and the Environment and the UiO Centre for Global Health.

Published Mar. 9, 2018 2:04 PM - Last modified Dec. 3, 2018 11:48 AM