Four months, nine countries, three regions: keeping in touch with midwives worldwide: Petra ten Hoope-Bender, ICM Secretary General, describes the multiple activities on behalf of midwives which she carried out in her last few months at ICM.

• Auteur: ten Hoope-Bender, Petra
• Tenlastelegging: International Confederation of Midwives

Handover to new Secretary General

As announced with great pleasure by Joyce Thompson in the last issue of IM, Kathy Herschderfer was selected for this position and an orientation programme was initiated. She was welcomed to headquarters in The Hague in September, and fortunately has been able to spend increasing amounts of time with us over the months of October and November, with the aim of making the handover smooth and effective.

Kathy and I attended the Averting Maternal Death and Disability Network Conference in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in the first week of October (see below), which provided a wonderful opportunity to introduce her to the main actors in the field of Safe Motherhood and to some of our official counterparts in WHO, UNICEF, UNFPA and FIGO.

Maternal mortality: pregnant adolescents

A meeting to discuss the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) on maternal mortality reduction, with reference to pregnant adolescents was held at WHO, Geneva, Switzerland, on 4-6 August 2003. The aim was to achieve consensus on the key interventions required, to prioritise these interventions, to identify key research gaps and to develop an action plan.

Participants came from the UN agencies, WHO, FIGO, ICM, Population Council, Family Health International (research agency), Family Care International, IPPF and bilateral donors including DfID (UK) and GTZ (Germany).

Background materials available included the review of the evidence developed by Dr Pieter Treffers and 'Adolescent Pregnancy--unmet needs, undone deeds' by Dr. Dina Neelofur-Khan. The meeting was opened by Dr Joy Phumaphi, the new Assistant Director General for Family and Community Health (FCH), successor to Dr Turmen, who spoke strongly on behalf of adolescents (10-19 years old) and their right to 'have their lives back'. Deaths of adolescent girls in pregnancy make up 18% of maternal mortality worldwide and the MDG will not be met without a special focus on their problems.

The main issues addressed were: sustainability of effects of interventions; clarity on definitions of child pregnancy and adolescent pregnancy; clarity between married and unmarried adolescents (their problems are similar, but legal ramifications are different); links into health systems and other programmes under development; contraceptive needs, including postpartum contraception; and the widespread lack of evidence for successful interventions, especially from developing countries.

Management of the third stage of labour & PPH

This FIGO/ICM Consensus Development meeting, held in in Ottawa, Canada, 7-8 August, was organised and funded by USAID with the aim of producing a joint statement on active management of the third stage of labour, to be the basis for a campaign for the prevention of post-partum haemorrhage (PPH) (see pp 66-67). ICM delegates were Joyce Thompson...