Project description
Explaining racial disparities in maternal health
Since the beginning of this century, scientists in the United States have been concerned about the ‘black maternal health problem’. Maternal health results among black women are consistently worse than for white populations as well as the worst among other non-white populations. The same trend has been observed in the EU. However, the situation in the EU is much less known and researched due to lack of efficient data based on race and ethnic category. The EU-funded RiR project proposes new theories and approaches in research on maternal health in Europe. This project will combine training in American scientific literature and comparative research on specifics of the black maternal health crisis in Europe. Dissemination of results in academia, NGOs and public health will enable better policies to redress health-related inequality problems in the EU.
Objective
tThe Racialization in Reproduction project (RiR) aims to analyse maternal health among black women in Europe and the US. Since the 2000s, a number of parallel trends testify that the maternal health outcomes of non-white populations (i.e. Black, Hispanic, Caribbean, Asian, Middle East and Pacific Islander women) are worse than those of white women in Europe and the US. Among non-white populations, black women present the worst maternal health outcomes in both contexts. This has led some scholars to speak about a black maternal health crisis, drawing on facts such as black women undergoing a greater number of medical interventions and being more exposed to risks related to maternal health. However, black maternal health matters are poorly understood as a public health problem in Europe where there is little data collected by race and ethnicity. RiR will introduce new theories and new methods to advance the knowledge of black maternal health in Europe. The project will consist of two key activities: theoretical training in the US where I will explore Black Studies literature that is missing in Europe; and research work to be carried out in the US to reflect in a comparative way on black maternal health in Europe. The overarching aim is to explore the continuities and specificities of the black maternal health crisis in Europe (where I have worked and collected data on this topic for the last ten years) and in the US (where I will carry out new fieldwork). In addition to dissemination in the academe, RiR aims to spread its results to a broad public: medical professionals, reproductive rights associations and NGOs, public health and gender policy-makers. Through these activities, RiR will make a concrete contribution to public health policies aimed at struggling inequalities related to the right to health in Europe.
Fields of science
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques.
Keywords
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
MSCA-IF - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF)Coordinator
75270 Paris
France