{"id":11745,"date":"2026-01-23T12:15:24","date_gmt":"2026-01-23T08:15:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/?p=11745"},"modified":"2026-01-23T12:15:26","modified_gmt":"2026-01-23T08:15:26","slug":"study-the-world-faces-a-shortage-of-nearly-one-million-midwives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/study-the-world-faces-a-shortage-of-nearly-one-million-midwives\/","title":{"rendered":"Study: The world faces a shortage of nearly one million midwives"},"content":{"rendered":"<p data-path-to-node=\"3\"><span class=\"\">According to a new study,<\/span><span class=\"\"> there is a catastrophic shortage of midwives worldwide.<\/span><span class=\"\"> A deficit of nearly <\/span><b class=\"\" data-path-to-node=\"3\" data-index-in-node=\"102\">1 million specialists<\/b><span class=\"\"> globally is endangering the health of pregnant individuals and increasing the risk of maternal and infant mortality.<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-path-to-node=\"4\"><span class=\"\">The study,<\/span><span class=\"\"> published in the journal <\/span><b class=\"\" data-path-to-node=\"4\" data-index-in-node=\"36\"><i data-path-to-node=\"4\" data-index-in-node=\"36\">Women and Birth<\/i><\/b><span class=\"\">,<\/span><span class=\"\"> emphasizes that the lack of necessary personnel directly impacts the quality of medical services.<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-path-to-node=\"5\"><span class=\"\">According to the global research,<\/span><span class=\"\"> an additional <\/span><b class=\"\" data-path-to-node=\"5\" data-index-in-node=\"48\">980,000 midwives<\/b><span class=\"\"> are required across 181 countries to ensure safe and high-quality medical care.<\/span><span class=\"\"> A shortage of this magnitude is a critical issue,<\/span><span class=\"\"> as comprehensive medical supervision provided by midwives could potentially reduce maternal and newborn mortality rates by <\/span><b class=\"\" data-path-to-node=\"5\" data-index-in-node=\"318\">two-thirds<\/b><span class=\"\">.<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-path-to-node=\"6\"><span class=\"\">Experts predict that concerted efforts in this direction could save <\/span><b class=\"\" data-path-to-node=\"6\" data-index-in-node=\"68\">4.3 million lives annually<\/b><span class=\"\"> by 2035.<\/span><span class=\"\"> More than 90% of the required workforce deficit is concentrated in low- and middle-income countries.<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-path-to-node=\"7\"><span class=\"\">In Africa,<\/span><span class=\"\"> for example,<\/span><span class=\"\"> nine out of ten women lack access to adequate medical care because the continent possesses less than half of the necessary human resources.<\/span><span class=\"\"> Similar problems persist in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Americas,<\/span><span class=\"\"> where only a small fraction of the demand is met.<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-path-to-node=\"8\"><span class=\"\">The <\/span><b class=\"\" data-path-to-node=\"8\" data-index-in-node=\"4\">International Confederation of Midwives (ICM)<\/b><span class=\"\"> indicates that the problem is not solely a lack of education.<\/span><span class=\"\"> In many countries,<\/span><span class=\"\"> healthcare systems fail to fully integrate and retain qualified personnel.<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-path-to-node=\"9\"><span class=\"\">The organization calls on governments to take urgent measures to strengthen midwifery as a profession and increase funding to create more resilient and secure healthcare systems.<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-path-to-node=\"9\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/global-development\/2026\/jan\/20\/world-shortage-million-midwives-icm-healthcare-mothers-babies-intervention\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Guardian<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>According to a new study, there is a catastrophic shortage of midwives worldwide. A deficit of nearly 1 million specialists globally is endangering the health of pregnant individuals and increasing the risk of maternal and infant mortality. The study, published in the journal Women and Birth, emphasizes that the lack of necessary personnel directly impacts [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11744,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1594,1665,1587,1657],"tags":[3982,2608,2404],"class_list":["post-11745","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-public-health","category-research","category-science","tag-midwives","tag-study","tag-orsuloba"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11745","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11745"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11745\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11748,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11745\/revisions\/11748"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}