India accounts for 20% of maternal deaths worldwide, 21% of all child deaths, and 25% of all neonatal deaths. India is rapidly urbanising. With more than 16.4 million inhabitants, Mumbai is India’s most populous city and more than half of Mumbai residents live in slums. Health indicators for slum populations rank them among the poorest, most under-served and most vulnerable groups. Access to public services is often compromised by poor environmental conditions and disjointed care patterns that result from moving back and forth between the city and their provenance. Slum residents are characterised by tremendous diversity in religion, language, race, caste, class, place of origin, livelihood, income levels, and practices.
Improving maternal and child health for the poorest through promoting access to quality basic health services: 2010-2011
Women and Children First is working with the Society for Nutrition, Education and Health Action (SNEHA) to strengthen and scale up the provision of basic health service delivery for women and children in slum areas in Mumbai. The project will assist existing health posts to offer free maternal and newborn health services to women and newborns, establish maternal and newborn health referral systems across Mumbai, and improve maternal, newborn and child health policy and implementation through advocacy and communications, contributing to India’s achievement of MDGs 4&5.
SNEHA was founded in 1999 by a group of doctors and social workers. The organisation dedicates its energies, expertise and resources to ensure quality nutrition, education and health care of women and children. Its mission is to impact quality of care and influence urban health policies through innovative solutions to problems in nutrition, education and health in urban communities. It builds sustainable and replicable models of intervention and partnerships that empower women to change their lives and those around them. SNEHA creates change agents, working to empower women and slum communities to be catalysts of change. SNEHA works with the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai to improve the quality of perinatal care; with the Integrated Child Development Scheme to improve nutrition in children from the slums; and with private health practitioners to standardise quality of maternal and newborn care.
