Chennai: Maternal deaths have come down by nearly half and infant deaths have dropped to single digits in Tamil Nadu over the past five years, health minister Ma Subramanian said on Friday.
Addressing district health officials and city health officers, Subramanian said measures taken by health officials, doctors and health staff brought down deaths of mothers and infants.
In 2021-22, during the Covid-19 pandemic, maternal deaths rose to 90.5 per one lakh births in the state compared to 73 the previous year. "Since then, we have seen a continuous decline," he said. In 2022-23, maternal deaths dropped to 52 per one lakh births and to 45.5 in 2023-24.
"This year, the maternal deaths dropped to 39.4," he said, quoting data between January and October 2024 from the state's health management information system, a web-based system that collects, stores and analyses health-related data. Similarly, infant deaths, which were 9.7 per 1,000 live births in 2020-21, rose to 10.4 during the pandemic in 2021-22. The following year, it dropped to 10.2.
In 2023-24, it was 8.2. This year, the state recorded 7.7 per 1,000 live births, he said, lauding doctors for the efforts they took to bring down deaths.
The minister said the state would take adequate measures to bring down the maternal mortality rate to zero. "As govt representatives, you must ensure that you do everything for this," he said.
The minister said health officials must take steps to prevent misappropriation of funds by health staff as happened in Pudukottai where two public health service staff members created fake identities of pregnant women and misappropriated 18.6 lakh over five years from the maternity benefit scheme. One of the staff members was suspended and the other was dismissed, he said.