Nus Ghani marked Baby Loss Awareness Week, 9th-15th October, by speaking in the House of Commons about baby loss and attending the Parliamentary launch of the draft National Bereavement Care Pathway. Minister of Health, Philip Dunne MP and Dr Clea Harmer, CEO of the charity ‘Sands’, spoke at the launch event.
The draft National Bereavement Care Pathway will provide a comprehensive resource for professionals to enable them to provide the necessary support for bereaved parents at whatever point their baby dies.
Over the past year, the Government has introduced various measures to improve safety, reduce stillbirths and other adverse maternity outcomes, as well as improving bereavement care. The Secretary of State for Health, the Rt Hon Jeremy Hunt MP, has pledged to attempt to halve the rates of stillbirth, neonatal and maternal deaths and brain injuries that occur during or soon after birth by 2030.
In order to help achieve this ambition, the Secretary of State launched the ‘safer maternity care action plan’ in October last year, which set out additional support for the maternity and neonatal services. In addition to this, there has been an increased focus on learning and best practice reflected in the ‘Saving Babies’ Lives care bundle’ which was launched by NHS England in March 2016. An £8.1mil maternity safety training fund has also been introduced which is designed to ensure that staff have the skills and confidence they need to deliver world-leading safe care. Finally, there has been a greater focus on innovation, with the launch of a maternity safety innovation fund of £250,000, which has supported 25 local maternity services in piloting new ideas.
Commenting on the issue, Ms Ghani said: “This important and powerful debate tackled baby loss, once considered a taboo subject. I contributed to the debate in the chamber as baby loss has been raised by mums and dads affected in Wealden.
This Baby Loss Awareness Week, my thoughts are with all those in Wealden who have gone through the trauma of losing a child. We are extremely lucky that we have our very own birthing unit and midwifes at the Crowborough Birthing Unit and I once again want to thank the hardworking staff at the birthing unit who support families every day.
Baby loss rates, particularly stillbirth rates, remain too high with an average of nine babies stillborn every day in the UK.
Over the past years the Conservative Government has made significant steps in improving safety and reducing adverse maternal outcomes. These changes have led to a notable decrease in the rates of neonatal mortality and stillbirths since 2010; however there is still more work to be done.
I congratulate my colleagues from both sides of the House who are members of the Baby Loss APPG on their continued hard work on delivering better outcomes for families, in conjunction with the Department for Health.”
