Sepsis Alliance

September 13, 2012 marks the first World Sepsis Day, an international event aimed at increasing awareness and decreasing the incidence of a preventable and treatable disease that kills 10,000 people every day. Ramona, Whitney, Heidi and Alana were the lucky ones. When they developed sepsis after delivering their babies, they received medical treatment that saved their lives. Orfa was lucky too. Featured in our documentary, "No Woman No Cry", Orfa made it to a hospital in Guatemala after her miscarriage resulted in multiple uterine abscesses. An astute doctor recognized her “miscarriage” may have resulted from an unsafe abortion and started her on antibiotics in time to reverse septic shock. For every mother who survives, approximately 73,000 to 100,000 do not. Sepsis is the third leading cause of maternal death in the US and other developed countries. It’s number two in the developing world. According to global medical experts, including Jim O’Brien, MD, MSc, an intensive care unit doctor on the board of directors for Sepsis Alliance (a charitable organization working to raise awareness about sepsis), half of the 258,000 people who die annually from sepsis could be saved with simple, rapid, antibiotic treatment.