Data released today by MBRRACE-UK show that progress to reduce stillbirths and neonatal deaths has stalled in the UK.
The data for 2024 show rates fell slightly from the previous year, but progress is too slow. The UK perinatal mortality rate remains similar to the 2020 rate (4.85), and stillbirth rates increased in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales in 2024.
The Sands and Tommy's Joint Policy Unit continues to call on governments across the UK to set ambitions to reduce perinatal mortality and preterm birth, focused on matching the best performing countries in Europe.
Although these figures show stillbirth and neonatal mortality rates fell slightly across the UK as a whole in 2024 compared with the previous year, progress is too slow.
There are also persistent and in some cases growing inequalities between people in different ethnic, social and regional groups. Black babies are still more than twice as likely as White babies to be stillborn, and babies of Asian Pakistani, Asian Bangladeshi and Black ethnicity are more likely to be born to mothers living in the most deprived areas of the UK.
Today’s MBRRACE-UK report shows stillbirth rates increased in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales in 2024. Although figures in these three countries can vary from year to year because of the small populations involved, the three-year rolling average for 2022-2024 shows for the first time that Wales had the highest rate of stillbirths and neonatal deaths of all four UK devolved nations.
This year can and should be a pivotal moment for maternity and neonatal care in the UK. A major assessment of services has been completed in Wales, an investigation is about to report in England and another is under consideration in Scotland.
Governments across the UK must set new ambitions to save more babies’ lives and put into place effective plans to make sure those ambitions are achieved.
- Georgia Stevenson, Head of the Sands and Tommy’s Joint Policy Unit
Sands campaigning for action in Wales
Today’s data from MBBRACE-UK confirms that there has been little progress in saving babies’ lives in Wales during 2024 - this is the third year in a row where Wales’s stillbirth rate has been higher than any other nation of the UK.
There has been no sustained drop in the number of babies being stillborn in Wales since 2018. There has also been a lack of sustained progress in reducing the rate of babies dying shortly after birth in Wales.
Together with bereaved parents from across Wales, we are demanding accountability and campaigning for the new Welsh Government to set targets to to reduce stillbirths and neonatal deaths.
By setting targets, the new Welsh Government will be making a commitment to saving babies’ lives and allow us to track progress and hold them to account.
The new Welsh Government have already backed targets to reduce child poverty – we need to see the same approach with baby loss.
The latest data from MBRRACE-UK show a stark reality. That over the past three years the stillbirth rate in Wales has been the worst in the UK. There has now been little progress in saving babies’ lives in Wales since 2018. We continue to see persistent inequalities resulting in worsening outcomes, and only one in twenty parents impacted by baby loss able to access vital mental health support.
Bereaved families working with Sands are demanding urgent action. The new Welsh Government must set clear, measurable targets to cut stillbirths and neonatal deaths. Without accountability and investment more families will face the devastating outcome of not being able to take their baby home.
- Clea Harmer, Sands' Chief Executive
In addition, there is an acute lack of mental health support for people who experience pregnancy or baby loss in Wales. According to research from Sands, only 5% of bereaved parents in Wales could access the mental health support they wanted through the NHS.
Currently, Cardiff and Vale is the only Health Board that provides a specialist psychological support pathway for pregnancy and baby loss for Wales.
Action needed to end inequalities in baby loss
Today's report also highlights that your ethnicity and where you live continues to impact on your risk of experiencing baby loss. Black babies are still twice as likely to be stillborn as white babies. Whilst babies born to mothers in the most deprived areas of the UK are more likely to die shortly after birth.
Any targets set to save babies’ lives should include specific targets to eliminate inequalities by both ethnicity and social deprivation.
Last month, bereaved parents joined with Sands to hand a letter with over 3,000 signatures to Downing Street, calling for an end to inequalities in baby loss.
We’re calling on governments across the UK to adopt targets to save babies’ lives and eliminate inequalities in baby loss.
Sands here to support
We know that when news like this is published it may be very difficult for bereaved parents, to see or read about. It is okay to take a break from this content if you need to.
Sands is here for everyone touched by pregnancy or baby loss. The charity offers bereavement support in many ways, because everyone grieves differently and this can change over time.
Find out more about all the ways the charity offers bereavement support.