Meg Wirth

Every 90 seconds, a woman dies in childbirth. ‘That’s 358,000 women a year, the vast majority in developing countries,’ says Meg Wirth, CEO of Maternova, a company she founded to pursue a mission close to her heart: to bring these figures down. To do so she has created a three-dimensional business that meshes information services, products and software tools.

Maternova started as an online platform focusing on innovations in the obstetrics market. After receiving countless requests to purchase items featured, Meg decided to expand the business by bundling and selling obstetrics packs for clinicians working in the developing world. ‘The Maternova Pak is not the typical birth kit focusing on hygiene, it also targets the leading cause of maternal mortality in childbirth—haemorrhage. We bundle products that no-one has brought together before and those we can’t find, we develop ourselves.’

Simply saving lives

Revenue from sales helps to maintain the information platform, a freemium model that drives traffic to the site. Items in the kit are simple but essential, such as a solar-powered headlamp, a chart on managing the third stage of labour and a plastic measuring device. ‘Midwives working in basic conditions need to estimate blood loss to evaluate whether to get the mother to a hospital,’ explains Meg, who has 20 years’ experience in health programme strategies and maternal health. ‘Visual estimates are not reliable, especially for night-time labour in homes without electricity.’ In a country such as Liberia, for example, 63% of births take place outside hospitals and only 46% are attended by a skilled practitioner.

Mapping the field

To aid clinicians in the field, Maternova’s premium mapping software locates healthcare centres and informs on the facilities available to aid life-saving decisions—crucial for Western obstetricians working in countries with which they are not familiar. Tailor-made mapping tools can also be commissioned and links made with other customers through the Maternova platform.

Design is another aspect to which Meg pays special attention, but not just to increase Maternova’s visibility: ‘Our products are warm and friendly! Ask any woman what she thinks of gynaecological instruments to know how important that is. For us it’s essential, especially when you hear reports of how violent birth can be in countries that lack resources.’ Simply designing a birthing light directed at the mother but which also shines on the midwife’s face can make birth a kinder experience. All Maternova products are stamped with a smiling face and a slogan: ‘Thank you for all you do for women.’

Meg’s engagement in public health started in 1991, when she read an article about Eula Hall, a woman who set up a clinic to provide better health care to people in a very poor Appalachian region of the US. ‘She was a social entrepreneur before the term was coined! I was captivated by the story, applied for a public service grant to work there and discovered a part of America that to me resembled the developing world. Girls were married aged 13 or 14, getting pregnant too young and often wholly unprepared for motherhood. Luckily when complications occurred, there was a hospital a few hours away and no deaths were incurred, but it sensitised me to this cause for good. Working in Indonesia some years later, I met women facing the same issues, severe complications and a real risk of death.’

Surprising figures

With Millennium Development Goal Number 5 aiming to achieve a 75% reduction in the Maternal Mortality Ratio by 2015, Maternova is set to play its part. Although figures compiled by the IHME do show progress, many maternal deaths could still be avoided, even in the United States. Ranked just 39th in the world, behind countries such as Albania and the UAE, both of which have reduced rates significantly, maternal mortality in the US actually rose by 2.1% per annum between 1990 and 2008, a massive 44% overall and the highest rise of all developed nations.