Saving Mothers' Lives: - Public Health Agency for Northern Ireland

Body mass index varies with age, being higher on average for older women, with trends being apparent
through the child bearing years, as Table A1.7 shows.
Table A1.7
Percentage distribution of Body Mass Index by age, women aged 16-24; England: 2003
BMI Percentage in each age group
16-24 25-34 35-44
18.5 or under 7.4 1.0 1.0
18.6-25.0 61.2 51.8 43.5
25.1-30.0 18.3 28.3 33.3
30.1-40.0 11.1 15.1 18.6
Over 40 2.00 3.00 3.50
All 100 100 100
Source: Health Survey for England.
Body mass index varies with age, being higher on average for older women, with trends being apparent
through the child bearing yeas, as Table A1.7 shows.
One factor which has changed for the better is smoking. As described earlier in Chapter 1, although
substantial proportions of women still smoke in pregnancy, the 2005 Infant Feeding Survey showed a
reduction compared with 2005 3 .
Despite this, as this Annex shows, there are many adverse trends. Others cannot be assessed because of
lack of data on the subject. Many like tuberculosis, are not recorded in relation to all pregnancies, although it is
beginning to contribute to deaths. Although data are not explicitly collected on the subject, it has been estimated
that the proportion of maternities to women with Female Genital Cutting / Mutilation (FGC/M) is rising 4 . In
addition, advances in health care have enabled many women experiencing serious conditions in childhood
which in the past would have been life threatening conditions to survive childhood into early adulthood, but few
data are available to document their extent in the population or how many attempt to have children.
Conclusions
The failure of the maternal mortality rate to decline has to be viewed in the light of both documented and
undocumented changes in the childbearing population. Although there have been positive changes, there
have also been increases in the numbers of women whose social circumstances and health put them at
risk of maternal death.
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