Pregnant women with depression twice as likely to die as those without, researchers warn

Women who experience depression during pregnancy or in the year after giving birth are at a higher risk of suicide and attempting suicide, researchers have warned.

The British Medical Journal study warned that women who develop perinatal depression are twice as likely to die compared to those who don’t experience depression.

Suicide was the leading cause of death for women in the UK in 2022 between six weeks and one year after birth, while deaths from psychiatric causes accounted for almost 40 per cent of maternal deaths overall, according to a Perinatal Mortality Surveillance report.

Last year an analysis by Labour revealed 30,000 women who were pregnant were on waiting lists for specialist mental health support. The number of women waiting rose by 40 per cent between August 2022 and March 2023.

The most recent NHS data shows in September 2023, 61,000 women accessed perinatal mental health services. For 2023-24, the health service must hit a target to have 66,000 women accessing care.

In August 2023, the Royal College of Midwives published a research warning half of anxiety and depression cases among new and expectant mothers were being missed amid NHS staff shortages in maternity care.

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Source: The Independent, 11 January 2024