In 2016, Emily Peters became, as she puts it, a "statistic in the maternal health mortality crisis." While giving birth to her daughter, she had an amniotic fluid embolism, a rare and life-threatening complication that landed her in the intensive care unit.
Peters eventually recovered. But she says she was disturbed by the dysfunction she witnessed during her hospitalization, "all these little cuts that are so demoralizing." For instance, her healthy newborn daughter was discharged from the hospital while Peters remained in ICU care — she and her husband had to pay for a private nurse so they wouldn't be separated from their days-old infant.
