BATON ROUGE, La. — Louisiana has the highest maternal mortality rate in the nation, more women die during pregnancy here compared to any other state.
For the first time, Eugene Collins is telling his family’s story, a story many families across the state of Louisiana have in common.
“You never think that your baby sister is gonna leave before you," Collins said. “I remember the last thing she told me was brother, I talked to God, and it's gonna be all right. And those words I still hate to this day.”
Jessica Collins was only 33 when she died, Collins described his sister saying, “Jessica was an amazing person. She was nice. She was one of the sweetest girls you’d ever want to meet.”
The young woman had just tied the knot with the love of her life and started a catering business.
“She was an amazing cook. Every one of my birthdays, she would always fix me a cake, and she would always put my fraternity letters on the cake and stuff like that. It was tradition. During the holidays, she was always the person cooking,” Collins said.
Jessica was a working mother, raising her 10-year-old daughter Alana. She is now a teenager. Her last three birthdays, holidays, and school events were spent without her mother.
“It was like this is my baby sister. You know, this the baby, like my baby sister, can’t walk out of this hospital. That's not even a possibility, right,” Collins said.
On March 2nd, 2020, Jessica was pregnant with her second baby Jayce Ruffin. Her brother says she was having some trouble, so she went to the ER.
“She went to the emergency room, and the emergency room actually sent her back home. My mom told her to go back. So she went back to the hospital. They sat her in the emergency room. It's unclear how long she sat there. She sat in the emergency room and had a stroke. Witnesses from the emergency room that day tell us that somebody drugged her across the floor. She was a bigger woman, and they had some trouble picking her up from what the witness told me, and they drug her across the floor.”
Jessica was then admitted to the hospital. “That's when I found out that the baby probably wouldn't make it, and Jessica was in some real danger,” Collins said.
She was transported to New Orleans after prematurely delivering her son, who remained at a hospital in Baton Rouge.
“My mom, who has her medical training and worked for a doctor for a number of years, just kept saying they’re not doing something right," Collins said. "They're giving her too much medicine, they’re giving her too much medicine.”
On March 15, Jessica passed away. Her newborn died a few days before her. They died in different hospitals, in different cities.
“My sister, my sister was at a Mardi Gras parade two weeks before. My sister was living life. She was vibrant. Like, we didn't know anything was wrong,” Collins said.
The Louisiana Health Department reports four black mothers die for every white mother, and two black babies die for every white baby. The state’s maternal mortality rate exceeds the national, ranking 47th out of 48 states.
Veronica Gillispie-Bell, an OB-GYN and Oschner’s Health & Medical Director, says the majority of deaths occur between the time of delivery up to one year postpartum and that between 2017-2019, there were 182 confirmed pregnancy-associated deaths across the state.
“Black women, based on our data, are at the greatest risk. We also see a disparity in terms of education. And so the majority are our deaths are among women that have a high school diploma or less," said Dr. Gillispie-Bell. “We have some unique challenges in Louisiana, one being maternity deserts where there's zero OBGYN or no birthing hospitals per 10,000 live births.”
Eugene Collins says the system failed his sister, “It was because people in that system didn't care enough. She went to the emergency room. You sent her home. She came back, and you sat in the lobby. She had a stroke sitting there.”
The Collins family, along with pregnancy advocates, are fighting for change, pushing lawmakers to do something so more mothers don’t die. Frankie Robertson, founder of the AMANDLA GROUP, an organization addressing social and political determinants of health that impact Black women says the state needs to eliminate all maternity care deserts.
“It is so important for moms to have continuous coverage. Giving birth does not end in that birthing room," Robertson said. “Having access to midwifery care. Allowing for midwifery care or midwives to be a part of the team making sure that they're covered in insurance that Medicaid is covering this care that reimbursement rates rather, are high enough so that midwives will and can accept Medicaid and run productive practices.”
Robertson says medical and mental health services need to be available to both expecting and new moms, “Perinatal mood disorders are common disorders during and after pregnancy. But they don't have to go untreated. They don't have to go undiagnosed. People don't have to push through things like this.”
Collins said, “There's no reason that black and brown women should walk in the hospital the same way, but less of them walk out.”
Jessica’s daughter Alana is now being raised by her grandmother Argarette Collins.
“It's still hard to not think that Jessica’s here. At points, it’s not even believable, right. Jessica's name is still saved on my phone", Collins said.
Her big brother says he still holds regret in his heart, for not being able to do more for Jessica.
The 2017 - 2019 Louisiana Pregnancy Associated Mortality Review Report found 80% of pregnancy-related deaths were considered potentially preventable.
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