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Georgia recently rebooted its Maternal Mortality Review Board after rejecting all 32 members last year. However, state officials do not say who the current members are.
The termination had responded to the obtaining of an internal report detailing the “preventable” deaths of two women who were unable to obtain legal abortion or timely care after Georgia banned abortion.
In September, Propublica published a story about the deaths of Amber Thurman and Candy Miller. They were the first reported cases of women who died without using care restricted by the state abortion ban. Before these stories, the state Department of Public Health had released the names of committee members to Propublica. Now, they say that revealing your name is a violation of state law.
The law states that the work of the committee is confidential and that some records and reports obtained and created by the committee are not subject to the Public Records Act. The law does not state that the identity of committee members is confidential. However, Nancy Nydham, a spokesman for the Ministry of Public Health, said the review of the law “has determined that the broad security directed at the committee should be extended to the identity of committee members.” She did not answer questions in August about why she could share the names of committee members, but she did not now.
The newly appointed committee considered the death of a mother, made recommendations to improve care for pregnant women, and held its first meeting on February 21.
Elizabeth Dawes, director of maternal and reproductive health at the public nonprofit Century Foundation, said that if the public doesn’t know who is on the committee, they could be distrustful of their findings. She is an advocate for black mothers and dies from pregnancy or birth-related causes at a higher rate than other groups.
“If everything is confidential, there’s no way you can really trust what comes out of it,” Dawes said. “They could completely ignore abortion. They could completely ignore race, racism, discrimination and what they wanted to say.”
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Daws said these questions are particularly important in Georgia. The state has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the country, especially among black women who die twice as much as white women.
The story of Sarmer and Miller sparked widespread outrage over the effects of the abortion ban. Georgia law prohibits the process six weeks later.
Thurman, who traveled to North Carolina and acquired abortion drugs, died of sepsis after a Georgia doctor delayed removal of infected tissue remaining in his uterus. Her case, and other cases identified in Georgia and Texas, show women face states that force hospitals and doctors to weigh criminal laws against abortion before providing care.
Less than two months after Propublica released the story, Georgia Department of Public Health Commissioner Dr. Kathleen Tohmy sent all members of the November 8 committee who said the information was inappropriately shared with external sources.
“Even if this disclosure was investigated, the investigation could not reveal which individuals disclosed sensitive information,” writes Toomey. “Therefore, the current MMRC will soon be disbanded and all member sheets will be filled through the new application process.”
The application process ended earlier this year. The Ministry of Public Health rejected a request for Propublica’s Open Records Act on February 27th, three weeks after the request was made. In response, staff said 30 people had been appointed to the board and attached to the committee’s first meeting on February 21 from a letter inviting new members.
Like all 50 states and other regions, there is a maternal mortality review board. They examine the deaths of pregnant women and new mothers, identify gaps in care and provide recommendations to improve treatment. Propublica recently discovered that the names of commissioners in 18 states with abortion restrictions have been made public or accessible through a request for public records.
Recently, some states have been attacked for allegedly politicizing the work of these committees.
The Idaho Maternal Death Review Board was allowed to rest in 2023 after a conservative group attacked recommendations to expand Medicaid for postpartum women. The state subsequently revived the committee as an advisory body to the state medical board.
Also, in 2023, Texas lawmakers changed the composition of the state committee more than a year after members spoke out about delays in the release of the report. She lost her seat. Authorities later appointed anti-abortion obstetrician Dr. Ingrid Scopp to the group. Texas MMRC is Roev. They are not considering deaths in 2022 or 2023, covering the first and a half years after Wade capsizes.
In a letter denied last year’s Georgia State Commission members, Toomey wrote that board reforms would not delay work. Nydam said in February that members of the Department of Public Health staff remained at work while the committee was inactive.
Texas banned abortions. The sepsis rate then skyrocketed.
“My work at MMRC hasn’t stopped,” Nydam wrote in an email. “The staff is doing the case abstraction before the case goes to MMRC.”
However, those familiar with the committee’s work said the entire committee met normally every other month because they asked not to name it because of their continued work with the Ministry of Public Health. The subcommittee met more frequently to review the cases.
“There’s no delay unless they meet every week,” she said.
Georgia MMRC had begun to identify deaths from 2023 when all members were rejected.
Kavitha Surana and Cassandra Jamarillo contributed to the report. Mariam Elba contributed to his research.
