INTRODUCTION Almost all (99%) maternal mortality occurs in developing countries (1). The World Health Organization (WHO) claims infection to be the primary cause of 15% of maternal mortality (2). However, as a secondary or undetected primary cause, infection may account for a portion of the maternal mortality attributed to haemorrhage (25%), unsafe abortion (13%), and other direct and indirect causes (27%). This may explain why a meta-analysis of developing-country data found infection accounted for a substantially-higher proportion of maternal mortality contributing nearly 30% of the direct causes of maternal mortality (3). From this perspective, just preventing or treating infection in developing countries could greatly reduce mater-nal mortality.
