Groundswell Fund: Birth Justice Fund

About

The Birth Justice Fund awards grants to organizations in the U.S. working to increase access to empowering and culturally relevant birthing options and promote changes in policy and practice aimed at improving birth outcomes. To date, the Fund has supported 18 organizations.

The United States spends the most of any industrialized country on childbirth, yet ranks 50th in the world for maternal mortality. This problem is even more acute for certain communities. African American women, for example, are four times more likely to die of childbirth related complications than white women and, according to current CDC data, their infant mortality rate is 2.4 times the rate for white women. Native American women face infant mortality rates at 1.5 times the rate of white women. In the past 15 years, cesarean rates had their sharpest increase (57 percent) in young women under the age of 25. Additionally, there are a significantly higher percentage of babies of color born prematurely or with low birth weight than white babies due to lack of access to adequate prenatal care and other inequities.

Midwifery and doula care are changing these outcomes by providing low-cost, high-quality care where it might not otherwise exist; reducing the rate of hospital interventions like cesarean birth; and lowering infant and maternal mortality rates among vulnerable populations.

About the Host

Groundswell supports reproductive justice and health, particularly for women of color, low-income women, and transgender people. They award grants, build capacity, and mobilize grassroots campaigns.