The Deputy Minister of Health, Dr. Grace Ayensu-Danquah, has cautioned that Ghana’s efforts to combat maternal mortality are being heavily compromised by an overreliance on elective Caesarean Sections (C-sections).
Speaking during a tour for the Maternal Mortality Action and Response Programme in Accra on August 6, the Deputy Minister revealed that 965 pregnant women died in childbirth in 2025, keeping the country’s maternal mortality ratio at 235 deaths per 100,000 live births. The World Health Organization (WHO) target for universal health coverage is 70 deaths per 100,000 live births.
Highlighting major risk factors, Dr. Ayensu-Danquah noted that the surge in maternal deaths directly correlates with an alarming rise in non-essential C-sections across health facilities.
She revealed “In one region, the C-section rate was 48 percent. I went to a ward with 50 women scheduled for elective C-sections, but I didn’t see any foetal or maternal distress, nor proper monitoring. In one operating theatre, a single doctor was performing 14 C-sections.”
She emphasized that saying an incised uterus from a prior C-section heightens risks in future pregnancies, as an atonic uterus struggles to contract after birth, causing severe and difficult-to-control bleeding.
Meanwhile, Technical Advisor to the Vice-President on Health, Dr. Kennedy Brightson has described C-Sections as problematic, drawing on lack of skills and logistical limitations.
In an interview on Joy News, he underscored the need for health workers to receive hands-on mentorship, continuous skills development and appropriate supervision to enable them respond effectively to complications during pregnancy and childbirth.
Dr. Brightson also highlighted measures such as formation of health units by the government, while citing the Free Primary Healthcare initiative as crucial to the fight against maternal mortality.
“…everybody is worried and we want everybody to put their hands into it so that we can save mothers…,”he said.
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Source: Benjamin Hutchful/ATLFMNEWS
