The maternity services of the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) are currently experiencing one of their most challenging periods. What were recently perceived as isolated incidents of concern are now increasingly recognized as a systemic crisis affecting the safety of mothers and newborns across the country. Staff shortages, deteriorating conditions in maternity wards, persistently high mortality rates, and an increase in legal claims point to deep structural problems not only in the maternity care system, but in the NHS as a whole.
Experts cite chronic staff shortages as the key reason for the crisis. According to the Royal College of Midwives, England was short of around 2,500 midwives in 2023–2025, and surveys showed that up to 87% of maternity wards were operating with critical staff shortages. Across the entire NHS, there were more than 100,000 vacancies in 2025, including nurses and midwives. Overworked staff were forced to care for several women in labor at the same time, which is contrary to clinical standards and, accordingly, increases the risk of errors. Studies published in the BMJ and The Lancet confirm a direct link between staff shortages, burnout, and increased patient mortality.
The situation was exacerbated by political and financial decisions made by the government, which in 2025 reduced targeted funding for the development of maternity services from £95 million to £2 million. Professional organizations called this decision undermining any attempts at systemic improvements. Against a backdrop of rising living costs and deteriorating working conditions, many midwives are leaving the profession or reducing their working hours, creating a vicious circle of shortages and overload.
The second cause for concern was the conditions in the maternity wards themselves. Inspections by the Care Quality Commission in 2022–2025 repeatedly identified breaches of infection control, dirty areas, worn-out equipment, and unsafe storage of medicines. In some trusts, such as Leeds Teaching Hospitals, cleanliness issues were directly linked to staff and resource shortages. Although such breaches are not universal, the regulator has identified up to two-thirds of maternity services as “needing improvement” or “inadequate” in terms of safety, indicating the scale of the problem.
Mortality rates remain the most painful indicator of the crisis. According to MBRRACE-UK reports, stillbirths and neonatal mortality have indeed declined in recent years, but the target of halving them by 2025 compared to 2010 has not been met. Maternal mortality in 2020–2022 was around 12–13 cases per 100,000 births, which is significantly higher than in many European countries. The persistent manifestations of social inequality are particularly alarming. For example, the risk of death is 2–3 times higher for women from poor areas, as well as for Black and Asian women. These differences have been officially recognized by the NHS and parliamentary committees as a systemic failure.
A series of high-profile investigations into trusts in Shrewsbury and Telford, East Kent, Leeds, and elsewhere revealed dozens, and collectively hundreds, of preventable deaths of mothers and newborns that occurred over many years. Independent reviews showed that the tragedies were not linked to rare clinical complications, but to recurring systemic failures such as delays in providing emergency care, misinterpretation of fetal monitoring, inadequate monitoring of high-risk women, and failure to follow basic clinical protocols. In many cases, families sought answers for years, facing denial, formal apologies, and attempts to minimize responsibility. Patient complaints were ignored or considered in isolation, without analysis of overall trends, and staff often worked in an atmosphere of fear of punishment, which prevented open discussion of mistakes.
Against this backdrop, a large-scale National Maternity and Neonatal Investigation was launched in 2025 under the leadership of Baroness Valerie Amos with the aim of obtaining a comprehensive assessment of the state of maternity and neonatal services in 14 NHS trusts. The interim findings of the investigation showed that the problems identified earlier were not local but systemic in nature. The same problems were observed in all regions: chronic staff shortages, worn-out infrastructure, weak clinical supervision, inadequate staff training, and a near-total lack of mechanisms for systematic learning from mistakes. The investigation also pointed to an entrenched culture of silence and blame-shifting, in which systemic problems were presented as individual mistakes. According to the commission, it was this culture that was one of the key reasons why warning signs were ignored for years and tragedies continued to repeat themselves in different parts of the country.
The financial consequences of the crisis have also reached alarming proportions. According to NHS Resolution, the total cost of compensation for claims relating to childbirth errors is estimated at £27-37 billion, which exceeds the budget for maternity services themselves. Experts point out that these funds could have been directed towards prevention, training, and infrastructure improvements if systemic problems had been addressed in advance.
Looking ahead to 2026, the government and the NHS have announced plans to increase the number of midwives, improve training, and address social inequalities in birth outcomes. However, professional organizations and independent analysts agree that without long-term investment and comprehensive reform of the NHS as a whole, it will be extremely difficult to turn the situation around. The crisis in maternity services reflects a broader problem: the “wear and tear” of a system that has been operating at full capacity for years.
Today, the question is no longer whether the state acknowledges the existence of problems, but whether there is sufficient political will and resources to prevent new tragedies. The fate of NHS maternity services in 2026 will be an important indicator of whether the British healthcare system is capable of emerging from a protracted systemic crisis.