The global maternal mortality ratio fell by 40% between 2000 and 2023, but an estimated 260,000 women still died from complications of pregnancy and childbirth in 2023, most of them from preventable causes, and progress has slowed since 2016.
Updated October 13, 2026. Written from the sources listed below, not independently peer-reviewed.
Of every 100 women worldwide who died from complications of pregnancy or childbirth in 2023, about how many died in sub-Saharan Africa?
260,000
Women who died from maternal causes
More than 700 deaths a day. Down from an estimated 443,000 in 2000.
Data year 2023. Source: WHO, UNICEF, UNFPA, World Bank Group and UNDESA/Population Division, 2025
197 per 100,000
Maternal mortality ratio
Maternal deaths per 100,000 live births (uncertainty interval 174 to 234), down from 328 in 2000. The SDG target is below 70 by 2030.
Data year 2023. Source: WHO, UNICEF, UNFPA, World Bank Group and UNDESA/Population Division, 2025
87%
Births attended by skilled health personnel
Global share, up from 80% in 2015. Coverage was 73% in sub-Saharan Africa and 64% in West Africa.
Data year 2025. Source: United Nations Statistics Division, UN DESA, 2026
Unit: maternal deaths per 100,000 live births
Modelled estimates of the UN Maternal Mortality Estimation Inter-Agency Group (2025 round, data up to 2023), as reported in the UN SDG Extended Report 2026. The ratio fell by 40.0% from 2000 to 2023 but by only 10.4% from 2016 to 2023. Each round revises the whole series, so these values should not be combined with figures from earlier editions. The SDG target is a global ratio below 70 by 2030.
SDG target 3.1 aims to bring the global maternal mortality ratio below 70 per 100,000 live births by 2030, with no country above 140. In 2023 the global ratio was 197. Reaching the target would require an average decline of 14.8% a year from 2024 to 2030, against 2.2% a year from 2000 to 2023 and 1.6% a year from 2016 to 2023. If the 2016–2023 pace continues, the global ratio is projected to fall only to about 177 by 2030. Meeting the target would avert an estimated 700,000 maternal deaths between 2024 and 2030.
Sub-Saharan Africa had about 70% of maternal deaths in 2023 and a maternal mortality ratio of 454 per 100,000 live births. A 15-year-old girl there faced a 1 in 55 lifetime risk of dying from a maternal cause, almost 400 times the risk in Australia and New Zealand (1 in 21,248).
Source: WHO, UNICEF, UNFPA, World Bank Group and UNDESA/Population Division, 2025The 37 countries classified as affected by conflict or by institutional and social fragility in 2023 had 61% of global maternal deaths but only 25% of live births. The ratio was 504 per 100,000 live births in conflict-affected countries and 368 in fragile ones, compared with 99 in all other countries.
Source: World Health Organization, 2025The maternal mortality ratio was 346 per 100,000 live births in low-income countries in 2023 and 10 in high-income countries. In most high- and upper-middle-income countries about 99% of births are attended by a trained midwife, doctor or nurse, compared with 73% in low-income and 84% in lower-middle-income countries.
Source: World Health Organization, 2025Four countries, Nigeria, India, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Pakistan, accounted for almost half (47%) of maternal deaths in 2023. Nigeria alone had more than a quarter (28.7%) of the global total.
Source: WHO, UNICEF, UNFPA, World Bank Group and UNDESA/Population Division, 2025Each country is shaded by its latest available value, so you can see where the gap is widest. Hover or tap a country, search for one, or open the full table.
Loading country values…
Values in per 100,000 live births.
Modelled estimates for 194 countries from the UN inter-agency group's 2025 round; the map shows each country's latest available year, currently 2023 for every country (years can differ). Where deaths and their causes are not fully registered, the values rely heavily on statistical models and carry wide uncertainty ranges; 70 is the SDG target for the global ratio by 2030.
Source: WHO, UNICEF, UNFPA, World Bank Group and UN DESA (Trends in Maternal Mortality), via World Bank Open Data. Latest year available per country; years differ.
Values load from World Bank Open Data. Simplified Natural Earth borders; they imply no position on disputed territories.
Instead of one “percent solved” score, DO GOOD rates three separate dimensions. A problem can have mature solutions that still reach too few people. These ratings are an editorial reading of the sources on this page, not a measured index.
Has the situation improved in the real world?
ModerateMaternal deaths fell from an estimated 443,000 in 2000 to 260,000 in 2023, and the global ratio dropped by 40%. Still, more than 700 women die every day, and a 15-year-old girl in sub-Saharan Africa faces a 1 in 55 lifetime risk.
How mature and validated are the available solutions?
HighThe main causes are well understood and most of them can be prevented or treated with established care: skilled attendance, drugs to prevent and treat bleeding, magnesium sulfate for pre-eclampsia, good hygiene and access to contraception. Large trials have added faster ways to detect and treat heavy bleeding and a heat-stable drug to prevent it.
How widely are effective solutions actually used?
ModerateSkilled health personnel attended 87% of births worldwide in 2025, but only 73% in sub-Saharan Africa and 64% in West Africa. UN reporting stresses that an attendant does not guarantee timely, good-quality care and that national averages hide large gaps within countries.
The estimates use an established method with uncertainty intervals: the 2023 global ratio lies between 174 and 234. But more than two-thirds of low-income countries had no standardised system for reporting causes of death, and the average yearly decline since 2016 could be anywhere from almost zero to 2.7%.
The global ratio fell by an average of only 1.6% a year in 2016–2023, below the 2.2% average since 2000 and far from the 14.8% a year now needed. Over that period it stagnated in four regions and rose in Latin America and the Caribbean.
An estimated 260,000 women died in 2023 while pregnant or within six weeks after the end of a pregnancy, from causes linked to the pregnancy or its care. That is more than 700 deaths a day, or roughly one every two minutes. Severe bleeding (mostly after birth), infections, high blood pressure in pregnancy, complications of delivery and unsafe abortion together cause around three-quarters of these deaths, and other women die because pregnancy worsens an illness they already had. Most of these complications can be prevented or treated. The global maternal mortality ratio fell by 40% between 2000 and 2023, but the decline has slowed since 2016.
Where a woman lives largely decides her risk. Sub-Saharan Africa had about 70% of maternal deaths in 2023, and just over 90% occurred in low- and lower-middle-income countries. Thirty-seven countries affected by conflict or fragility recorded 61% of maternal deaths but only a quarter of the world's live births, and within countries poor women in remote areas are the least likely to receive adequate care. Gains can also be reversed: deaths rose from an estimated 282,000 in 2020 to 322,000 in 2021, a rise to which the COVID-19 pandemic may have contributed, and UN reporting in 2026 warns that shrinking funding for maternal and newborn health threatens recent progress, especially in fragile settings.
Global figures come from the UN Maternal Mortality Estimation Inter-Agency Group, formed by WHO, UNICEF, UNFPA, the World Bank Group and the UN DESA Population Division. Many countries do not register every death or its cause, so the group combines several kinds of data with statistical models. The main measures are:
Maternal death
The death of a woman while pregnant or within 42 days after a pregnancy ends, from any cause related to or made worse by the pregnancy or its management, but not from unintentional or incidental causes. Deaths after 42 days are recorded separately as late maternal deaths and are left out of the headline ratio.
Maternal mortality ratio
The number of maternal deaths per 100,000 live births in the same period. It is the indicator for SDG target 3.1, which aims for a global ratio below 70 by 2030, with a supplementary aim that no country is above 140.
Lifetime risk
The probability that a 15-year-old girl will eventually die from a maternal cause. Worldwide it was 1 in 272 in 2023, ranging from 1 in 55 in sub-Saharan Africa to 1 in 21,248 in Australia and New Zealand.
Modelled estimates
The estimates combine death registration records, specialised studies, household surveys and censuses in a Bayesian model and are published with uncertainty intervals that have an 80% probability of containing the true value. Each round replaces all earlier estimates, so differences between editions do not show real change over time.
What works
Care by trained midwives, doctors and nurses during pregnancy, childbirth and the weeks after can save the lives of both women and newborns, because timely management of complications often decides between life and death. The share of births attended by skilled health personnel rose from 80% in 2015 to 87% in 2025, close to the global target of 90% for 2030.
Limits
Coverage was 73% in sub-Saharan Africa and 64% in West Africa, and sub-Saharan Africa had about 12.6 nursing and midwifery personnel per 10,000 people in the latest data, against a global average of 40. A skilled attendant alone does not guarantee timely, evidence-based care: staff also need the skills, supplies and working conditions to provide it.
What works
Bleeding after childbirth causes nearly 45,000 deaths a year. WHO's 2025 guidelines recommend a quality-assured drug that makes the uterus contract for every woman right after birth, preferably oxytocin, with heat-stable carbetocin as an alternative. Once heavy bleeding is diagnosed, staff should immediately start a bundle of uterine massage, contraction drugs, tranexamic acid, intravenous fluids, examination and escalation of care.
Limits
Heavy bleeding is not always predictable and can kill a healthy woman within hours if she is unattended, so trained staff, medicines and, for the worst cases, surgery or blood transfusion must be within reach of every birth. Anaemia, which is very common in low- and lower-middle-income countries, makes bleeding more likely and its effects worse.
What works
High blood pressure disorders of pregnancy are the third most common cause of maternal death worldwide. When pre-eclampsia is detected and managed before seizures (eclampsia) set in, lives can be saved, and drugs such as magnesium sulfate lower the risk that eclampsia develops.
Limits
This depends on women receiving good-quality care during pregnancy, on staff who measure blood pressure and act on the results, and on timely referral when the condition becomes severe. Poor women in remote areas are the least likely to receive such care.
What works
When serious complications arise, women need fast access to facilities that can give blood transfusions or perform surgery. Infections after childbirth can largely be avoided through good hygiene and by recognising and treating early signs of infection in time.
Limits
UN reporting traces the gap in maternal deaths between rich and poor countries to long-standing inequities in access to quality services, skilled staff and timely emergency obstetric care. Blood is scarce and expensive in low-income countries, and WHO names shortages of essential medical supplies among the main barriers to good care.
What works
Preventing unintended pregnancies avoids the risks that come with them, and WHO states that all women, including adolescents, need access to contraception, safe abortion services to the full extent of the law, and good-quality care after an abortion. In sub-Saharan Africa the share of women whose need for family planning is met with modern methods rose from 51.6% in 2015 to 58.6% in the latest UN estimate.
Limits
Globally that share barely moved, from 76.4% in 2015 to 77.3%. Access depends on laws, supplies and affordability, and the end of the Demographic and Health Survey Program in 2025 will leave a large gap in comparable family planning data.
Promising, but not proven at scale. The stage shows how far each approach has come; it is not a recommendation.
In a trial with more than 200,000 women in 80 hospitals in Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa and Tanzania, measuring blood loss with a simple, low-cost collection drape and giving a bundle of treatments at once, rather than one after another, cut severe bleeding (losing more than a litre of blood) by 60% and reduced the need for blood transfusions. WHO's 2025 guidelines now recommend the bundle. Whether hospitals can sustain these results outside a trial, including smaller facilities, remains to be shown.
Oxytocin, the standard drug to prevent bleeding after birth, must be stored and transported at 2 to 8°C, which is hard in many countries, and heat can make it less effective. In a WHO study of close to 30,000 women in 10 countries, heat-stable carbetocin prevented excessive bleeding as well as oxytocin, and it keeps its effect for at least three years at 30°C and 75% humidity. WHO's 2025 guidelines list it as an alternative to oxytocin; how widely and affordably it now reaches the countries with the most maternal deaths is not well documented.
Based on a study of more than 300,000 women in 23 countries, the largest on the topic so far, WHO's 2025 guidelines advise staff to act once blood loss reaches 300 mL and vital signs are abnormal, instead of relying only on the traditional threshold of 500 mL, and to measure blood loss with calibrated drapes. How quickly this becomes routine in busy, understaffed maternity wards is not yet known.
Anaemia is widespread in low- and lower-middle-income countries and makes heavy bleeding more likely and more dangerous. Alongside daily oral iron and folate during pregnancy, WHO's 2025 guidelines include intravenous iron when anaemia must be corrected quickly, for example after heavy bleeding or when tablets do not work. Using it routinely in low-income health systems will depend on supplies, trained staff and cost.
Implementation gap
Global funding for maternal and newborn health is shrinking. In a rapid WHO survey of its country offices in March and April 2025 on the effects of cuts to health aid, 63% of responding countries reported job losses, temporary leave or salary cuts for health and care workers, with nursing and midwifery staff among the most affected. The end of core funding for the Demographic and Health Survey Program in 2025 also leaves a gap in survey data, especially where death registration is unreliable.
Implementation gap
Sub-Saharan Africa had about 12.6 nursing and midwifery personnel per 10,000 people in the latest data, against a global average of 40. Training, placing and keeping enough staff in rural and fragile areas needs steady budgets over many years.
Implementation gap
A skilled attendant at birth does not guarantee timely, evidence-based care. National averages also hide severe gaps within countries that follow wealth, remoteness and fragility, even where national coverage targets are within reach, and WHO counts poor quality of care, including disrespect and mistreatment, among the failures of health systems.
Coordination gap
The 37 countries affected by conflict or fragility accounted for 61% of maternal deaths in 2023 but only 25% of live births. Keeping maternity services staffed and supplied in such settings depends on humanitarian and development agencies planning together over long periods.
Technology gap
Oxytocin, the preferred drug to prevent bleeding after birth, must be stored and transported at 2 to 8°C, which many countries find hard, and heat exposure can weaken it. Getting quality-assured medicines through hot and remote supply chains is still a practical obstacle.
Knowledge gap
More than two-thirds of low-income countries had no standardised system for reporting causes of death, so the estimates rely on surveys, special studies and models. As a result, the average yearly decline since 2016 could lie anywhere between almost zero and 2.7%.
Unresolved questions, not vetted breakthroughs. Answering any of them would change what is possible.
Why did the global decline slow after 2016, with stagnation in four regions and an increase in Latin America and the Caribbean? How much is due to weak health systems, conflict, the COVID-19 disruption, a growing share of deaths from pre-existing illnesses, or limits of the data?
Heavy bleeding and pre-eclampsia are not always predictable. Can affordable tests or preventive treatments identify the women at highest risk early enough to protect them, especially where emergency care is far away?
Can early detection and bundled treatment of bleeding reach trial-level results across whole health systems, including small clinics, and what training, supervision and supplies keep staff using them over time?
How can countries without complete death registration measure maternal deaths and their causes quickly and accurately enough to guide decisions, and to detect the effects of funding cuts, now that a major household survey programme has ended?
Organisations that train midwives, supply essential medicines or support emergency care at birth rely on donations. Before giving, look for groups that publish independent evaluations and cost data.
Much maternal health work in the countries with most deaths depends on international aid and UN programmes. Telling your elected representatives that you support this funding is one of the few ways individuals can influence it.
Midwives, obstetricians, anaesthetists, nurses, supply-chain specialists, biomedical engineers and data analysts can support maternal health programmes, for example in training, equipment maintenance or health information systems.
Women with heavy bleeding after birth may need a transfusion, and blood is scarce and expensive in many low-income countries. Donating where you live supports the blood supply that your local maternity services depend on.
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WHO, UNICEF, UNFPA, World Bank Group and UNDESA/Population Division (UN Maternal Mortality Estimation Inter-Agency Group), published 2025
The official global estimates, published 7 April 2025 with data up to 2023 and still the latest round as of October 2026. Source of maternal deaths (443,000 in 2000, 260,000 in 2023, over 700 a day), the global ratio (328 and 197, uncertainty interval 174 to 234), the 40% decline, annual rates of reduction (2.2%, 1.6%, 14.8% needed), the 2030 projection of 177, the 700,000 deaths that meeting the target would avert, lifetime risks, the sub-Saharan Africa share and ratio, country shares, regional stagnation, cause ranking, HIV-related deaths, definitions, methods and data gaps.
World Health Organization (7 April 2025), published 2025
WHO's summary of the 2000–2023 estimates. Source of the main causes (around 75% of deaths), the share of deaths in low- and lower-middle-income countries, ratios by income group, conflict and fragility (37 countries, 61% of deaths, 25% of births, ratios of 504, 368 and 99), skilled attendance by income group, the 2020–2021 rise, social determinants, barriers to care and the recommended interventions.
United Nations Statistics Division, UN DESA (information as of 30 April 2026), published 2026
Official SDG progress storylines. Source of the trend values (328 in 2000, 228 in 2015, 197 in 2023), skilled birth attendance (80% in 2015, 87% in 2025; 73% in sub-Saharan Africa, 64% in West Africa) and the notes on quality and subnational gaps, family planning coverage, nursing and midwifery density, the 2025 WHO stocktake of aid-cut impacts on health workers, the end of the DHS Program and shrinking funding for maternal and newborn health.
World Health Organization, FIGO and ICM (news release, 5 October 2025), published 2025
Launch of WHO's 2025 consolidated guidelines on postpartum haemorrhage. Source of the estimate of nearly 45,000 deaths a year, the 300 mL threshold, the study of over 300,000 women in 23 countries, calibrated drapes, the MOTIVE treatment bundle, oxytocin and heat-stable carbetocin, misoprostol as a last resort, and oral and intravenous iron for anaemia.
World Health Organization (news release, 9 May 2023), published 2023
WHO summary of the E-MOTIVE trial published in the New England Journal of Medicine. Source of the trial size (over 200,000 women in 80 hospitals in Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa and Tanzania), the 60% reduction in severe bleeding, fewer transfusions, and the note that blood is scarce and expensive in low-income countries.
World Health Organization (news release, 27 June 2018), published 2018
WHO summary of the CHAMPION trial of heat-stable carbetocin, published in the New England Journal of Medicine. Source of the trial size (close to 30,000 women in 10 countries), equal effectiveness with oxytocin, stability for at least three years at 30°C and 75% relative humidity, and oxytocin's need for storage at 2 to 8°C.