Table 1.

Characteristics of the study countries: trends in the maternal mortality ratio (MMR) and proportion of maternal deaths due to PPH.

Country	Recent trends in MMRa	Maternal deaths during postpartum period or due to PPH
Kenya	MMR decreased between 2000 and 2017 from 708 to 342 per 100,000 live births (2017 UI: 253 to 476) (6).	Obstetric haemorrhage was found to be the underlying cause of 192, or 49% of the 945 maternal deaths during this period (25)
Nigeria	Fourth highest MMR globally, estimated number of maternal deaths in 2017, with nearly 67,000 maternal deaths and accounted for 23% of global maternal death (917; UI 658 to 1320) (6).	PPH was reported as 2.2% of births over a one-year period in 42 tertiary hospitals and was the most frequent obstetric complication across all hospitals. Nearly 42% of maternal deaths resulted from PPH (26)
South Africa	MMR decreased between 2000 and 2017 from 160 to 119 per 100,000 live births (2017 UI: 69 to 153) (6).	PPH identified as the 3rd leading cause of maternal deaths between 2014 and 2017, accounted for 16.9% (n = 624) of the total maternal deaths during this period (27)

^a Maternal mortality ratio; UI, uncertainty interval.