Ga West Municipal Hospital-Ghana Health Service, Amasaman, Accra, Ghana.
Covenant University, Ota, Ogun state, Nigeria.
BMC Pregnancy Childbirth. 2023 Jan 4;23(1):6. doi: 10.1186/s12884-022-05339-x.
Africa has the highest rates of maternal deaths globally which have been linked to poorly functioning health care systems. The pandemic revealed already known weaknesses in the health systems in Africa, such as workforce shortages, lack of equipment and resources. The aim of this paper is to review the published literature on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on maternal and child health in Africa. The integrative review process delineated by Whittemore and Knafl (2005) was used to meet the study aims. The literature search of Ovid Medline, CINAHL, PubMed, WHO, Google and Google scholar, Africa journals online, MIDIRS was limited to publications between March 2020 and May 2022. All the studies went through the PRISMA stages, and 179 full text papers screened for eligibility, 36 papers met inclusion criteria. Of the studies, 6 were qualitative, 25 quantitative studies, and 5 mixed methods. Thematic analysis according to the methods of Braun and Clark (2006) were used to synthesize the data. From the search the six themes that emerged include: effects of lockdown measures, COVID concerns and psychological stress, reduced attendance at antenatal care, childhood vaccination, reduced facility-based births, and increase maternal and child mortality. A review of the literature revealed the following policy issues: The need for government to develop robust response mechanism to public health emergencies that negatively affect maternal and child health issues and devise health policies to mitigate negative effects of lockdown. In times of pandemic there is need to maintain special access for both antenatal care and child delivery services and limit a shift to use of untrained birth attendants to reduce maternal and neonatal deaths. These could be achieved by soliciting investments from various sectors to provide high-quality care that ensures sustainability to all layers of the population.
非洲的孕产妇死亡率居全球最高，这与医疗保健系统运作不良有关。大流行揭示了非洲卫生系统早已存在的弱点，如劳动力短缺、设备和资源匮乏。本文旨在回顾已发表的关于 COVID-19 大流行对非洲母婴健康影响的文献。采用 Whittemore 和 Knafl（2005 年）提出的综合审查过程来实现研究目的。文献检索限定于 2020 年 3 月至 2022 年 5 月期间在 Ovid Medline、CINAHL、PubMed、世界卫生组织、Google 和 Google Scholar、非洲期刊在线、MIDIRS 发表的文献。所有研究都经过 PRISMA 阶段，筛选了 179 篇全文论文以确定是否符合纳入标准，其中 36 篇论文符合纳入标准。纳入的研究中，6 项为定性研究，25 项为定量研究，5 项为混合方法研究。根据 Braun 和 Clark（2006 年）的方法进行主题分析以综合数据。通过检索，出现了以下 6 个主题：封锁措施的影响、COVID 担忧和心理压力、产前保健出勤率下降、儿童疫苗接种、减少医疗机构分娩和母婴死亡率增加。文献回顾揭示了以下政策问题：政府需要制定强有力的应对机制，以应对对母婴健康问题产生负面影响的公共卫生紧急情况，并制定卫生政策以减轻封锁的负面影响。在大流行期间，需要为产前保健和分娩服务提供特殊通道，并限制使用未经培训的接生员，以减少母婴和新生儿死亡。这可以通过向各个部门征求投资来实现，以提供确保所有人群可持续性的高质量护理。
