What would it take to stop women from bleeding to death after childbirth?

A senior midwife sutures a woman who has just given birth in Borno State, Nigeria. Around the world, postpartum bleeding is a serious issue, leading to 43,000 deaths a year. A new series of reports proposes ways to prevent and to treat it. Lynsey Addario/Getty Images hide caption

"I was running around hospitals trying to get blood. By the time I got back she was gone."

Dr. Olufemi Oladapo is haunted by the memory of the excited mother-to-be whom he couldn't save in Nigeria in his early career. After waiting six years to become pregnant, she died of postpartum hemorrhage. That's the leading cause of maternal death, responsible for 43,000 deaths a year.

To fight this tragedy, Dr. Oladapo, who's now a physician with the World Health Organization's Special Programme on human reproduction, co-authored a sweeping three-part series published today in the Lancet. characterizing the crisis and laying out how to solve it.

For stories about life in our changing world, subscribe to our Global Health newsletter.

The condition impacts some 27 million women each year. Some bleeding is normal after childbirth. But excessive bleeding — a postpartum hemorrhage — is incredibly dangerous.

"It can become a medical emergency very quickly," says Adam Devall , a professor of maternal health at the University of Oxford. A woman who has had an otherwise uncomplicated labor can deteriorate within minutes if the bleeding is not recognized and treated promptly.

" Typically, the women say, 'I feel like I'm dying.' They actually sense it when they are bleeding too much," says Ioannis Gallos , who's with the World Health Organization's Maternal and Perinatal Health Unit. "If no one was to act on it, within 10 to 20 minutes, easily a woman can die."