New SC taskforce hopes to improve health of infants, mothers in Rural SC

(WPDE) — A new taskforce report on improving maternal and infant health has been released by the South Carolina Institute of Medicine and Public Health.

The non-profit organization works to improve health and healthcare in South Carolina. This report focuses on increasing access to care in rural South Carolina and providing an action plan with recommendations for care delivery to support moms and babies.

Almost 90% of maternal deaths in South Carolina were found to be preventable in 2021, according to the South Carolina Maternal Morbidity and Morality Review Committee’s 2025 Legislative Report.

In 2022, 2023, and 2024, South Carolina earned an ‘F’ on the March of Dimes report card for preterm birth rate.

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“The health concerns around mothers and babies in South Carolina are alarming, but a lot of the common issues we see are preventable,” says Maya Pack, executive director of IMPH. “This task force has spent months researching and discussing actionable solutions to better the health of mothers and infants— and through collaboration and action, we know it can be done.”

An action plan was included in the task force report to improve the health of mothers and babies in South Carolina, including the following recommendations:

• Ensuring all women in South Carolina’s rural communities have access to affordable and convenient prenatal and postpartum care within 30 miles of their home or place of work through mobile care units deployed to the most underserved areas of the state, capitalizing on recent advances in telehealth to increase remote monitoring and replicating successful group prenatal education.
• Expanding and empowering essential members of the prenatal and postpartum workforce who provide care to moms and infants in rural areas of South Carolina by promoting team-based care, innovation in reimbursement policy and adequate pay.
• Addressing transportation challenges and barriers by implementing models that work for high-risk and high-need moms and babies and replicating them in rural areas across the state.

“There’s a reason this report is focused on mothers and infants living in rural South Carolina,” says Dr. Lisa Waddell, task force chair. “Women in rural areas of the state often experience poor health outcomes due to the unique barriers they face when compared to their urban counterparts, including health care provider maldistribution across the state, labor and delivery unit and hospital closures in rural areas, transportation challenges, lack of insurance coverage, and lower household incomes, to name a few.”

The action plan hopes and aims to create lasting improvements and outcomes for the health of mothers and babies across the state.