Maternal Mortality, Human Rights and Accountability

Maternal mortality remains one of the highest causes of death in the world today. The main objective of this book is to focus on a critically important part of maternal mortality and human rights viz. monitoring, accountability and redress. Accountability encompassing the local, national and international levels. The context includes the UN Human Rights Council maternal mortality resolution, as well as MDG 5.

Importantly, the book focuses on neither maternal health, nor maternal mortality, nor even maternal mortality and human rights. Its focus is the very important issue of maternal mortality, human rights and accountability. The work provides an introduction to a selection of key issues on maternal mortality, human rights and accountability. It comes out of a roundtable conference held in Geneva in 2010 that aimed to focus on one critically important part of maternal mortality/human rights – accountability – and provide a forum (and book) where maternal health and human rights experts could listen and learn from each other. The volume also includes additional resource material on maternal mortality, human rights and accountability.

Paul Hunt is a Law Professor at Essex University (UK), Adjunct Professor at Waikato University (New Zealand), and human rights advisor to WHO Assistant Director-General Dr.Flavia Bustreo. He served as UN Special Rapporteur on the right to the highest attainable standard of health (2002-2008) and has an Honorary Doctorate from the Nordic School of Public Health.

Tony Gray completed his DPhil in Theology and has publishhed in the area of philosophical theology. After working in the production of personal biographies, he now runs his own publishing services company whilst undertaking freelance research in topics as diverse as family history, religion and human rights.