Closing the Gap is Added to Anti-Racism Toolkit for Midwives
The Royal College of Midwives has added The Positive Birth Company’s Closing the Gap workshop to their new Decolonising Midwifery Education Toolkit
Trigger warning: this post discusses racial disparities in maternal mortality rates, please read with care.
We’re so proud to have been added to the RCM’s new ground-breaking Decolonising Midwifery Education Toolkit, which has been designed to improve diversity in midwifery education. The toolkit is the first of its kind and addresses multiple issues, including ensuring the midwifery curriculum educates students to care for women, birthing people and babies from non-white backgrounds. Our Closing the Gap online workshop is the only non-NHS resource to be included in the toolkit, which is being shared with midwives across the UK.
What does this mean for women and birthing people?
As it stands, 94% of the midwifery curriculum is centred around a euro-centric model which can have devastating outcomes for non-white women and birthing people. Multiple reports have highlighted a racial disparity in birth and health outcomes for women, birthing people and their babies.
The most recent figures from the latest MBRRACE report found that Black women are 3.7 times more likely to die in childbirth than white mothers, and that South Asian women face a maternal mortality rate that is 1.8 times higher than white women. In 2022, campaigning group Five X More (who are featured in our Closing the Gap online workshop) also released a report, as did the charity Birthrights, with both calling for better education of health professionals in all aspects of maternity care and diversity.
Closing the Gap, and the new RCM Decolonising Midwifery Education toolkit have both been created in response to this urgent human rights issue. It means that healthcare professionals will be better trained to care for patients from non-white backgrounds, saving the lives of both mums, birthing people and their babies.
How can you help?
We’re thrilled that the RCM has included Closing the Gap in their Decolonising Midwifery Education toolkit. It means that more midwives will hear about the workshop we created with leading inclusion and healthcare professionals. But we still need your help.
In order for our free two hour, self-paced online workshop to reach all healthcare professionals across the UK that it needs to, we need your help in spreading the word. We’ve made it super easy for you.
Head to this page to send our template email to your GP surgery or local maternity unit. It just takes three clicks (30 seconds!) and could save a life.
Print off our Closing the Gap leaflet and take it to your next midwife appointment
Go old school and send some snail mail - you can print off our template letter to send it in the post to your GP surgery or local hospital. Just head to the Take Action page of our Closing the Gap section on our website.
“Inspire others by being a champion of positive change. This will help to improve outcomes for all pregnant and birthing people. ”