Chennai: When India’s second Covid wave hit Tamil Nadu in 2021, pregnant girls bore a disproportionate share of the harm. Hospitals overflowed, lockdowns stored expectant moms away from clinics, and residential deliveries surged by 66.3% in comparison with pre-pandemic ranges. Maternal mortality price — the variety of deaths per 100,000 reside births — practically doubled.
However what occurred after was sudden. A study by IIT Madras, printed within the peer-reviewed journal BMC Being pregnant and Childbirth, discovered that TN’s healthcare system didn’t merely get better from the pandemic, however emerged stronger. By 2023 and 2024, the state’s maternal and new child health indicators surpassed even pre-pandemic ranges, pushed by years of sustained govt funding in emergency infrastructure.
“In the course of the pandemic, the state witnessed extreme disruptions in maternal healthcare entry. The analysis sought to grasp whether or not these disruptions had long-term results,” mentioned Prof P Kandaswamy who led the analysis, a retired IPS officer and professor of observe at IIT Madras’s departments of administration research and information science and AI. “The findings current a powerful and inspiring counter-narrative,” he mentioned.
The study is constructed on ambulance registry information — from 2017 to 2024 — drawn from 108 emergency medical providers. House deliveries fell by 36.1% under pre-pandemic baselines. Miscarriages dropped by 28% and complex vaginal births by 19.2%. Neonatal mortality fell by 17% and toddler mortality by 14%. The maternal mortality ratio fell to 37 deaths per 100,000 reside births — a 19% drop from pre-pandemic ranges and significantly decrease than nationwide common.
The emergency response system improved in parallel, the outcomes confirmed. Ambulance response instances for non-facility calls fell by as much as 52.7% in opposition to pre-pandemic benchmarks. “Maternal and new child health indicators confirmed substantial enchancment within the post-pandemic resilient section in comparison with pre-pandemic baselines,” mentioned co-author Ashwin Prakash of Moody’s Analytics, Bengaluru.
The researchers traced these to a collection of govt interventions that gained momentum after the primary wave. With elevated budgetary allocations, the state expanded its ambulance fleet, recruited extra paramedics and obstetricians, and launched risk-stratified antenatal care beneath schemes similar to Pradhan Mantri Surakshit Matritva Abhiyan and TN’s Dr Muthulakshmi Reddy Maternity Profit Scheme.
The researchers warning that higher ambulances alone didn’t straight trigger fewer deaths. What labored in TN, with its comparatively sturdy health infra and administrative capability, will not be simple to copy in states the place maternal mortality is larger and emergency methods weaker. But, the state’s expertise exhibits that investing in emergency healthcare throughout a disaster can save lives lengthy after it ends.
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