Every 16 seconds, a baby is stillborn. This amounts to an estimated two million stillborn babies globally every year. These deaths reach far beyond the loss of life. Women and their families often face traumatic, long-lasting impacts after experiencing a stillbirth. Profound psychological suffering and stigma from their communities are common. 

Even more tragically, most of these deaths could have been avoided with high-quality care during the antenatal period and birth. Over 40% of all stillbirths occur during labour; many could have been prevented with improved monitoring and access to emergency obstetric care.

Despite the magnitude, these losses remain a neglected issue. Worldwide, data on stillbirths are largely absent, resulting in serious gaps in service delivery for pregnant women and poor support services for mourning mothers. Among the 195 countries for which the United Nations Inter-Agency Group for Child Mortality Estimation (UN IGME) generates stillbirth estimates, nearly a third have either no stillbirth data or no quality data. 

These gaps in counting and reporting of stillbirths must be urgently addressed. 

The panel will address three key questions:

1) Which critical data gaps must be closed to end preventable stillbirths?

2) Which challenges stand in the way of collecting stillbirth data?

3) Where do we see innovative solutions to improved stillbirth data availability and quality?

The session will bring together governments, international organizations, and civil society to share expertise and experience, highlight best practices, and provide practical recommendations on collecting stillbirth data and improving evidence to end preventable stillbirths.