West and Central Africa faces huge challenges in ensuring equitable access to maternal, newborn, child and adolescent health services.    

The region has the highest total and adolescent fertility rates in the world and unacceptably high maternal mortality rates, at 679 deaths per 100,000 live births.   It also has the highest population in sub-Saharan Africa but an insufficiently skilled health personnel to meet the demand for health services. The recent 2014 Ebola outbreak clearly underlined the weakness of existing systems in a significant number of countries.  

In response, UNFPA has adopted a holistic and integrated approach to these challenges and is working with governments and other partners towards its goal of delivering a world where ‘every pregnancy is wanted and every childbirth is safe’.