Countries with the Highest Maternal Mortality
Key Findings
About This Dataset
Countries with the Highest Maternal MortalityMaternal death is overwhelmingly concentrated in sub-Saharan Africa and conflict-affected states. South Sudan has the world's highest maternal mortality ratio at 1,223 deaths per 100,000 live births - meaning more than one mother dies for every 100 births - followed by Chad (1,064) and Nigeria (1,047). To put that in perspective, these rates are over 100 times higher than in the safest countries, where fewer than 5 mothers die per 100,000 births. The Central African Republic (835), Guinea-Bissau (725) and Liberia (652) also record extreme levels. Every country in the top twelve is in sub-Saharan Africa except Afghanistan (620). The common threads are poverty, weak health systems, few skilled birth attendants and ongoing conflict, all of which deprive women of the emergency obstetric care that makes childbirth safe elsewhere.
Data Insights
Numbers, trends & sources behind this chart
Methodology & source
- Data source
- WHO / UN Maternal Mortality Estimation Group
- Coverage
- 12 entities · 12 observations
- Measure
- Maternal Deaths per 100,000 Live Births (2020)
- Last updated
- 14 July 2026
- Compiled by
- The ANYSTAT team, from the source above
- Values are shown as reported by the source. Nothing is rescaled, rebased or converted — the only changes are thousand separators and decimals shown to two places.
- Entities are ranked highest-first on their value.
Data Sources & References
All external sources cited in this dataset
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