Maternal Health in India: Contemporary Issues and Challenges

The inequalities prevailing in maternal health care services adversely affect the life chances and capabilities of the mothers as well as their children. The prevalence of high rates of miscarriages, stillbirths, congenital diseases, neonatal mortalities, infant mortalities and maternal mortalities necessitate a close scrutiny of the prevailing policies and academic approaches related to the issues. The problems are not merely related to inadequacy of health care facilities or their improper distribution; the approaches of various state governments are themselves redundant and obscure. The volume depicts how skewed obsession of the policy makers and health delivering agencies with bio-medical approach and ignorance towards the interwoven social determinants of health result in adverse health outcomes. Fourteen papers included in the volume study different states of India including Uttar Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh and Manipur from diverse perspectives. The essays offer an appraisal of the reproductive trajectory from pregnancy to childbirth across religious, regional, economic, occupational, ethnic and educational backgrounds. The volume intends to serve the needs of students of sociology, anthropology, social work, social policy, public health, medicine, economics, geography, women studies and all those concerned with these issues.…