Maternal mortality rates...

Today I was looking at a list of the numbers of women who die in childbirth by country and I was surprised to see that the death rate of mothers in Canada was much less than in the U.S. - 6.6 deaths per 100,000 live births as contrasted 16.7 in the States.

I'm wondering why. And why is Italy doing much better than other countries, with a rate of only 3.1?

I looked up Maternal Mortality in Canada and that didn't illuminate much: the causes of death are about what I'd have expected. Presumably higher death rates occur when there is less preventative care, less access to emergency medicine, a shortage of doctors, or... what?

As for the statistics broken down by province, I see Yukon Territory and PEI have the highest maternal mortality numbers. I can see why the Yukon might be so - harsher conditions, very rural, greater difficulties in transportation and communication - but why PEI? It's a little place. It has doctors and hospitals... and a higher maternal death rate than the Yukon.

Looking at the full stats, I see Malta, Canada, Spain and Japan as being in the same grouping. But Canada's rate has actually gone up over the past decade or two, while those others have gone down. That's the Harper government for you: less social support, less medical support, less support in general.

In fact, Canada at #9 is the only country in the top ten of that list where the maternal mortality rate has gone up - in most of those other countries, it has gone down dramatically. The next country on the list where the mmr has risen is Switzerland, at #19.

Except for one, all the countries at the bottom of the list are in Africa. The exception is Afghanistan, at #181, where the maternal mortality rate is more than twice that of Somalia. Looking at the bottom part of the list makes me sad.