BBC, Nat Geo & W.K. Kellogg Publish Articles on Midwives and GPA's Work
Traditional midwife Lucía Girón Pérez, of Tenejapa, Chiapas, after attending a home birth. Photo Courtesy of Janet Jarman, a Mexico City-based photographer and filmmaker
The role of traditional midwives has always been key to women's health, especially in rural areas that lack access to quality health services. This was especially evident during the Covid-19 pandemic and currently, where the work of midwives in southern Mexico and Guatemala has increased exponentially. Lucía Girón Pérez, a traditional midwife who is part of the Nich Ixim Midwife Movement of Chiapas, which GPA supports, is featured in the National Geographic article photographed by Mexico City-based photojournalist and filmmaker, Janet Jarman. In 2019 Lucía attended 346 births, in 2021 403, and this year she has attended more than 90 births. You can read about the challenges these women face in "To save lives, midwives mix Mayan heritage with Western medicine."
The work of midwives in Chiapas, Mexico, along with the work of GPA, is also featured in the BBC StoryWorks article, "How a Marriage of Traditional and Modern Midwifery is Transforming Lives in Rural Mexico." In Chiapas, Indigenous women have a much higher risk of dying in childbirth than other women in the state, a preventable tragedy, and one GPA is working to reverse.
The Nich Ixim Midwife Movement and our GPA are also featured in the Kellogg Foundation article, "Celebrating International Day of the Midwife," which on the occasion of May 8, International Day of the Midwife, celebrated the value midwives and skills midwives bring to women's health throughout the world, and especially in Mexico, which has an estimated 20,000 midwives, according to the Human Rights Commission in Mexico City. For our part, GPA collaborated with the Nich Ixim Midwife Movement of Chiapas to organize a press conference and a photo mural campaign to create awareness about the importance of the midwife for women and families, and the need to recognize and protect them as essential health workers.