International Maternity Healthcare Rights

Women deserve dignified, respectful health care, free from discrimination and coercion, throughout pregnancy and childbirth—rights protected by international human rights law.

The United Nations Global Strategy for Women’s and Children’s Health upholds these rights, promoting access to midwives.

Every day, approximately 800 women die from preventable pregnancy and childbirth-related causes—one woman every two minutes. For every death, 20-30 women suffer from injuries, infections, or disabilities. Most of these cases are preventable.

Ensuring safe pregnancies and childbirth is a human rights imperative.

The International Registry of Midwives (IRM) collaborates globally with governments and experts to expand and credential maternity care workers. These skilled professionals strengthen communities, health systems, and uphold evidence-based, human rights-centered maternal and child health standards.

IRM supports a woman’s:

• Right to life

• Right to health

• Right to privacy

• Right to equal treatment

• Right to informed consent and childbirth education

• Right to refuse medical intervention during labor

• Right to choose her birth partner and team

• Right to choose her birthing place and position

• Right to dignified, respectful care