One of the deadliest places on Earth to have a baby
Post Reports
The Washington Post
4.4 • 5.1K Ratings
🗓️ 6 May 2022
⏱️ 19 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Today on Post Reports, we go to Sierra Leone, where having a baby can mean risking your life.
Read more:
Today, we follow the story of Susan Lebbie. Lebbie is 17 and has just given birth to her son, Evan. Throughout her pregnancy she was terrified of facing the same fate as her mother, who died while giving birth to Susan.
Susan’s fears are not unfounded: One in 20 women in Sierra Leone die as a result of pregnancy or childbirth, according to the latest United Nations estimate, most often from losing blood. The West African country consistently ranks as one of the deadliest places on Earth to have a baby. But practically every death is preventable.
To be pregnant in Sierra Leone is to be at the mercy of resource-strapped institutions and the global trends shaping them. Survival is too often up to luck. West Africa bureau chief Danielle Paquette reports.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | This week, I have been thinking a lot about pregnancy, about the fear that comes with |
| 0:07.5 | getting pregnant, especially when it's unplanned, about the different paths that people take |
| 0:12.4 | to becoming a parent, about the choices they have and the choices they don't have. |
| 0:18.4 | Of course, in the US right now, we are talking a lot about how those choices could change |
| 0:23.3 | in the very near future. |
| 0:25.5 | But today, we wanted to visit a place where, for various reasons, women have very few |
| 0:30.6 | choices, and we're having a baby can mean risking your life. |
| 0:41.5 | Last year, reporter Danielle Piquet visited a state hospital in Cono, Sierra Leone. |
| 0:48.5 | She had been following a teenager named Susan Lebi over the course of her pregnancy, |
| 0:53.5 | and Susan had just given birth to her son, Evan. |
| 0:56.2 | She's tired like his mama. |
| 0:59.2 | She's very calm. |
| 1:01.4 | Very calm. |
| 1:02.4 | Very calm. |
| 1:04.4 | She's 17 and she grew up fearing pregnancy because she lost her own mother when her mother |
| 1:16.1 | was giving birth to her. |
| 1:17.5 | Her mother, blood out, was terrible. |
| 1:20.2 | And she just sort of never really wanted to get pregnant. |
| 1:32.3 | Susan was terrified of pregnancy and birth, in part because Sierra Leone consistently |
| 1:38.4 | ranks as one of the deadliest places on earth to have a baby. |
| 1:43.8 | The numbers alone just shocked me. |
| 1:46.4 | The way researchers measure the maternal mortality rate is the number of women who die as a result |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Washington Post, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Washington Post and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.