About MCAI

Our Vision

MCAI is an international maternal and child healthcare charity. We work in countries where there is extreme poverty to sustainably transform the management of emergencies in mothers, newborns and children with the aim of reducing mortality and morbidity. We also aim to alleviate suffering. We achieve this by:

• capacity building
• health system strengthening
• empowering health care staff and civil society to effect systemic change from the bedside in villages to hospitals
   

Read about our different projects here...

Why Do We Do It?

There are still far too many women, babies and children who do not receive the healthcare that they need - especially emergency care.

• Every year 536,000 women die from pregnancy-related causes
• The risk of a woman dying as a result of pregnancy or childbirth during her lifetime is about 1 in 8 in Afghanistan and Sierra Leone compared with fewer than 1 in 17,400 in Sweden
• Children who have lost their mothers are up to 10 more times more likely to die prematurely than those who haven’t

  (All statistics taken from the UNFPA website)

In countries where there is extreme poverty there is a great need to increase what has sometimes been a limited focus on emergency healthcare. Many health problems are caused by time-sensitive illness and injury such as severe infection, accidental injury or complications of pregnancy. Treatment in the first few hours of an emergency has critical and long-term implications for the individual.