Morning Briefing

Time examines the issue of maternal mortality in Afghanistan, where the Health Ministry says "about 18,000 Afghan women die during childbirth every year." The magazine writes, "According to a recent report by the NGO Save the Children, Afghanistan ranked as the worst place to give birth, followed by Niger and Chad," Time writes, adding that getting women in rural areas to hospitals, a lack of midwives and a stigma against pregnancy "because it's a public acknowledgement of sex with their spouses" are all challenges to improving maternal health in Afghanistan. The magazine highlights the HHS-funded Afghan Safe Birth Project, which has "has helped reduce deaths during [caesarean] sections at [Kabul's Rabia Balkhi Hospital] by 80 percent" since 2008, according to Faizullah Kakar, an epidemiologist and special adviser on health to Afghan President Hamid Karzai, Time reports. "[I]n April, the U.S. government cut the program's $5.8 million annual funding, and Kakar says the Afghan government doesn't have the money to keep it going," the magazine notes (Kakissis, 10/11).