About Obstetric Violence – The Pixel Project

What is Obstetric Violence?

Obstetric violence describes abuses, mistreatments and human rights breaches suffered before, during and after childbirth. [1][2] This encompasses many violations, including (but not limited to):

Physical abuse
Verbal abuse
Coercive, uninformed or unconsented medical procedures (including sterilisation and forced abortion [3])
Lack of confidentiality or privacy
Not providing medication for pain
Not admitting pregnant people to health facilities
Neglect during childbirth resulting in life-threatening, avoidable complications [4]
Physical restraint [5]
Obstetric racism. [6]
Forced sterilisation [17][18][19]

Obstetric violence is “widespread and systematic in nature” [3] and occurs across the world. This is exacerbated by the particular vulnerability of pregnant people during childbirth, and is compounded with other vulnerabilities such as youth, being unmarried, of low socio-economic status, an ethnic minority, a migrant, and/or living with HIV. [4]

In 2019, the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and Girls reported these root causes for obstetric violence:

Constraints within health systems such as poor funding, training and not meeting obligations to provide adequate facilities and staff – including gender and power imbalance of health professionals.
Discriminatory laws, practices and harmful stereotypes. These are even worse for vulnerable groups creating intersecting discriminations and cultural hierarchies in addition to gender-based discrimination. An example of a discriminatory law is the ability in some countries for a third party to give consent to a medical procedure on a pregnant person’s behalf.
Inherent unjust power dynamics where women are reliant on care providers, in particular those who abuse the use of “medical necessity” to justify actions. [3]

Facts and figures

As of now, there is no standardised way of measuring obstetric violence [7], so statistics are often localised and based on small studies even though it is a global issue. [8] [9]

A comparison of studies from 34 countries showed similarities in obstetric violence across the world. For example, people in many different countries (high/middle/low income) reported experiencing “physical force”, “harsh or rude language”, “discrimination”, “refusal to provide pain relief “neglect, abandonment or long delays”, “poor communication”, and/or “lack of privacy” by healthcare providers. [10]
A 2019 World Health Organisation study from Ghana, Guinea, Nigeria and Myanmar reported that more than a third of women observed or surveyed experienced mistreatment. [11]
A 2019 study in the USA reported that 1 in 6 respondents reported at least one type of mistreatment, with these numbers increasing for women of colour. [12]
A 2022 study in Australia found that 11.6% of respondents experienced obstetric violence. [13]

Consequences

If parents are too afraid to use maternal healthcare services, they may risk their own lives, or their children’s to avoid healthcare services in the future. [4]
The weakening of family ties and parental bonding. [14]
Increased occurrences of postpartum depression [15]
Increased risk of post-birth trauma and feelings of loss of dignity. [16]
Forced sterilisation of Indigenous women violates their reproductive rights and autonomy [17] [18] and may be considered a form of genocide. [19]

Footnotes and Further Reading

Additional Resources

Video Credits and Further Viewing

Picture Credits

Photo by Tima Miroshnichenko via Pexels.