Men Cannot Become Fathers Without Mothers

Written by Sunil Desai.

As people around the world celebrate Father’s Day, we should all remember that men cannot become fathers without mothers. For most people, becoming a father or mother is the greatest event in their lives. Yet tragically, every year hundreds of thousands of women (and shamefully even girls) die due to complications during childbirth. As described in detail on the Every Mother Counts website, the vast majority of maternal mortality can be prevented simply by ensuring all women receive proper maternal health care before, during, and after pregnancy. While some progress in reducing maternal mortality has been made in recent years, there is still a long way to go. Oddly, this tragedy is considered by many to be a women’s issue dependent on women to take action. Go to any maternal health forum and you will be surrounded by women.

Sunil and his daughter.

Throughout the world, it is men, not women, who overwhelmingly control the means to ensure women receive proper maternal health care. These means include international, national, and local government resources and policies as well as those of private institutions. And because men hold the majority of leadership positions in governments and private institutions around the world, the fate of those resources and policies lies in the hands (actually hearts and minds) of men. Furthermore, and just as importantly, men control their individual involvement to ensure that women benefit from those resources and policies. Thus, regardless of governmental and institutional resources and policies, the inaction of individual men, usually the respective fathers, can determine whether or not every mother actually receives the maternal health care necessary to prevent maternal mortality.      

This Father’s Day, instead of just receiving gifts and enjoying the privilege and honor of being fathers, let us encourage each other to do more to help end maternal mortality. Men in leadership positions can ensure the necessary resources are available and polices implemented. And every man can take his own action to ensure every mother gets the maternal health care she needs and deserves.

More on the Author, Sunil Desai:

Sunil Desai is the President and founder of The Bindi Project, a non-profit organization dedicated to fostering love and respect for women and girls in India by engaging boys and men directly and broader audiences through public and social media.  He envisions an Indian society that loves and respects all its daughters, values them as integral and productive members, and enables them to live happy, healthy and fulfilling lives, free from all forms of violence, exploitation, and discrimination.  Previously, he served for 20 years in the U.S. Marine Corps, achieving the rank of lieutenant colonel and holding a variety of command, operations, planning, and executive staff positions both in garrison and combat and receiving over 30 individual and unit awards and medals including the Bronze Star.  Additionally he served as an International Affairs Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, a Next Generation Fellow with the American Assembly at Columbia University, and as a delegate to Asia Society’s inaugural Asia 21 Young Leaders Summit.  Sunil graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy with a BS in mathematics and earned an MA in International Affairs from the Catholic University of America.  He lives near Philadelphia with his wife and two children.