Safe Maternity Project at Cox’s Bazar Hospital for Women and Children

Funded 2007

Over 95% of the poor rural women in the area around the Cox's Bazar Hospital in Bangladesh had home births and very little prenatal care. The Safe Maternity Project was a pilot project to encourage these women to make use of the maternity services provided by this charitable hospital.

Virginia Gildersleeves International Fund gave partial funding for this project to cover the medicines for 50 women and babies including prenatal care, labor and delivery costs and vaccinations.

Seminars held in remote satellite clinics of the hospital where there is no other form of medical care available to the poor, ensured that maternal education reached the village women at their doorstep.

The first baby was born at Cox’s Bazar Hospital for Women and Children on December 14th, 2007. Since then, more than 50 babies have been born, up to April 2008. It was initially thought that recruitment of pregnant women to a Maternity Project would be difficult due to the current environment in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh of a conservative society where women rarely leave their homes, and the overwhelming tendency of home births. However it was found that more and more women are opting to have hospital deliveries. When asked for the reasons why, the women explained that they opted for hospital birth for their own health and safety, safety of their newborns, a growing acceptance of hospital delivery in society and because there was no fear of hospital costs.

Each baby born at the hospital is given a hamper of first clothes, blankets, toiletries and other essentials as a gift from the hospital. The blankets and clothes are especially well-received by the mothers.