HSPH receives $14.1M grant
Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) has been awarded a $14.1 million, four-year grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to test the effectiveness of an innovative checklist-based childbirth safety program in reducing deaths and improving outcomes of mothers and infants in 120 hospitals in India. The program was developed by the World Health Organization (WHO) and HSPH. HSPH Associate Professor in Health Policy and Management Atul Gawande and co-principal investigator Jonathan Spector, research associate in health policy and management at HSPH, are leading the BetterBirth clinical trial. The study will evaluate the impact of the WHO Safe Childbirth Checklist program at hospitals in Uttar Pradesh, India. Of 130 million births annually in the world, nearly 350,000 result in the mother’s death, 1 million in intrapartum stillbirth, and another 3.1 million in infant death during the neonatal period. Most deaths occur within 24 hours of delivery. In Uttar Pradesh the mortality...