.png)
PUSH is the International Confederation of Midwives’ global campaign for woman-centred care, advocating for midwives as the way to get us there.
A future where women’s voices shape their healthcare, placing them at the centre of sexual and reproductive health services. A global shift in health where their unique needs, preferences, and rights are prioritised, respected, and embedded in every aspect of health systems.
.png)
We are transforming health systems by championing midwives as essential providers of high-quality, respectful sexual and reproductive healthcare. We work to ensure women’s voices are heard and their needs, preferences, and rights shape their healthcare. Through advocacy, partnerships, and policy change, we enable midwives to deliver woman-centred care and encourage other health professionals to adopt this approach.
The evidence for midwives is clear. Yet, too many people don’t know about midwives and their untapped potential to transform the lives and health of women, newborns and communities.
In 2020, the International Confederation of Midwives (ICM) convened workshops with midwives’ associations, funders, partners, and global advocacy experts to tackle this challenge. These discussions highlighted the need for a global push to combat misconceptions about midwifery and rally feminist movements around the life-enhancing potential of midwives.
At ICM’s 32nd Triennial Congress in 2021, the PUSH Campaign was officially launched as a decade-long initiative. The campaign focused on mobilising stakeholders and creating a governance structure that ensured cross-sector collaboration and inclusivity.
In 2023, a groundbreaking survey of over one million women sent a clear message: women want a healthcare system that prioritises respect, dignity, and holistic care. Their voices reaffirmed the need for woman-centred care (WCC)—and PUSH has evolved to meet this demand.
This next phase will feature a more focused and strategic approach, setting clearer, more achievable goals to maximise advocacy and impact. Over the next two years, PUSH will build momentum, strengthen fundraising efforts, and demonstrate tangible results.
Building on the successes of its first phase—which advocated for better pay, resources, and respect for midwives—this next phase shifts the focus to women. WCC is embedded in partnership, empowerment, choice, and respect, core principles of the Midwifery Philosophy of Care. Advocating for WCC and midwives are two sides of the same coin. Midwives are the vehicle to achieving WCC and PUSH is strengthening the movement for midwifery and reinforcing the inseparable partnership between WCC and midwives.
At its core, PUSH is about bringing together women, midwives, and advocates to drive real change. Now more than ever, it’s time to be in solidarity and PUSH for rights, PUSH for women, PUSH for midwives!
