Millennium Development Goal 5

Improve maternal health
-    The challenge is to increase planned parenting including birth timing, birth spacing and completion of child bearing through effective public health. Various estimates of the maternal mortality rate indicate a reduction during the 1990s. In 2001 there were 25 maternal deaths.

Target 6: Reduce by three-quarters, between 1990 and 2015, the maternal mortality ratio

16. Maternal mortality ratio per 100,000 live births  1992:  550                  1996:  138             1997:  209             1999:  135

• The number of maternal deaths is very variable from year to year and the maternal mortality rate varies as a result. However the overall trend from the early 1990s is a decline in maternal mortality, and comparing 1992 and 1999 the Solomon Islands has achieved the target of reducing maternal mortality rate by two thirds

17. Proportion of births attended by skilled health personnel  1994:  85.36% (SI HDR 2002)

• The proportion of births attended by skilled health personnel (nurse or doctor) is high