Baby deaths highlight inequalities
SURVEY SHOWS INFANT MORTALITY AMONG ASIANS 60 PER CENT HIGHER THAN WHITE BRITONS
A MUM has described how she lost her baby just after he was born as a survey last week showed that Asian babies have a 60 per cent increased risk of neonatal mortality compared to white babies.
Bliss, a charity for premature or sick babies, called for action to tackle high rates of neonatal mortality as new figures released during Baby Loss Awareness Week (9-15) found that Asian and black babies and women living in the most deprived areas of the country continue to be at substantially increased risk of neonatal mortality.
Researchers examined perinatal deaths from 2019 for the MBRRACEUK Perinatal Mortality Surveillance Report. They found that while the overall rate of neonatal mortality has fallen by 12 per cent since 2015, rates remain staggeringly high for Asian and black babies.
Women living in the most deprived areas had a 73 per cent higher risk of neonatal death compared to women living in the least deprived areas, and this excess risk increased between 2015 and 2019.
Madhuri Bedi, a local councillor from Slough, told Eastern Eye how she lost her son at just a day old. After a long and difficult journey to conceive, Bedi became pregnant in 2003, but things changed before she reached 30 weeks.
Concerned as she had felt no movement, she went to the hospital where she was assured she wasn’t in the “danger period”, but was told her baby would come early.
Bedi recalled, “I stayed the night and they said they would check me the next morning, but there was different staff on duty and it was a totally different ballgame. “We just weren’t being called for the scan, we kept going to the scanning area, but they were very busy.”
Bedi and her husband tried one last time to be seen, when she finally got a scan and she was sent home.
“I thought I created a fuss, phoning everyone. We both [her husband] are from very large families and I felt a bit silly, so I told them everything’s fine,” Bedi said.
However, the next morning, Bedi was in the “most excruciating pain” she had ever experienced and went straight into labour. She rushed to the hospital where she had an emergency C-section, and gave birth to her son Vishaal, weighing just 2.3 ounces.
A few hours later the doctors said there was something wrong with his brain. “The next morning, they said it was not looking good and the best thing to do was to turn off his life support machine,” Bedi recalled.
A patient in the bed next to hers was offered a drug called Strep B for her child.
“I remember them offering it to her, but not me. I said, ‘what about me’ but they said it was a trial and were just picking people at random.”
The irony was that Vishaal’s brain had a Strep B infection. Bedi described the stigma she faced from some family members after she lost her baby.
“I had my very close aunt say to me, ‘what you did in your last life comes back in this life’.
“There were others who said things like, ‘there was no life to speak of, ‘don’t worry, you’ll have another (baby)’. “All these things don’t help,” Bedi said. Among south Asian communities, there is an unspoken pressure of women having children and women expected to not have any complications during and after the pregnancy.
Data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) released in May this year showed that infant mortality rates are particularly high in the northwest of England and the West Midlands, where there is a substantial BAME population, with social deprivation identified as a key factor. However, Bedi is not sure the high percentage of neonatal deaths among Asians could be down to only deprivation. “I can’t say this for everyone, but I know in my case it was a lottery and I didn’t get picked,” she told Eastern Eye.
“We, as a society, have to learn to treat everybody as an individual and not see colour. “We need to see the person.”
She added: “I can’t identify that it’s deprivation. I don’t buy that, It has to be more to this.”
Data from the National Child Mortality
Database (NCMD) found that child mortality increased as deprivation increased.
Seven indicators were used to determine the outcome – income, employment, education, health, crime, access to housing and services, and the living environment.
Chief Executive of Bliss, Caroline LeeDavey, said: “It is shameful that in the UK babies are more likely to die depending on their ethnicity or where their parents live, and it is vital that these ongoing health inequalities are addressed as a matter of urgency.
“While it is positive to see further reductions in the overall neonatal mortality rate, today’s report highlights how much more needs to be done if the National Ambition of halving neonatal deaths in England is to be achieved by 2025.”
She added: “Further research must be undertaken to develop interventions which work to reduce the neonatal death rate equitably – and this must include
working closely with families.”
A spokesperson from NHS England said: “The NHS is one of the safest places in the world to give birth, and this report shows that rates of stillbirth overall have reduced by more than 20 per cent since 2013. In England, we are continuing to take steps to reduce stillbirths and neonatal deaths, and have launched a programme of activity to tackle inequalities in maternity services, including issuing a new equity strategy last month and fasttracking care for communities at higher risk through our ongoing continuity of carer programme.”
The NHS added it provided extra support for pregnant women with Covid-19 in black, Asian and mixed ethnic groups.
Women will receive care from the same midwife and team before, during and after they give birth. This is proven to significantly improve women’s overall experience of care and their outcomes, NHS England said.