By: Isra Chaker, Founder and CEO

War is often discussed through politics, strategy, and infrastructure. But on the ground, one of the most dangerous places in a conflict zone is not the frontlines, but delivery rooms. During conflict, hospitals are damaged or inaccessible, supply chains collapse, skilled care disappears, and something as fundamental as giving birth becomes life-threatening. 

My heart breaks for each mother and child in Iran and Lebanon, and across the region, because they face the most devastating consequences of today’s ongoing conflict. Women and girls have a right to safe birth, even in crisis. The dangers expectant mothers face are proof of the failures of our humanitarian system – and the urgency to reshape them to protect our most vulnerable. 

As I write this piece, CARE International estimates that across the Middle East more than 1.6 million pregnant women are living under the threat of armed conflict. In Lebanon alone, 12,200 pregnant women have been displaced by the ongoing conflict, and nearly 1,350 of them are expected to give birth within the month. 

Yet many of these women are residing in shelters with limited access to even the most basic antenatal care. It is here, amid the sirens, fear, and uncertainty, in makeshift — often unsanitary conditions — that thousands of these women will give birth, and face the threat not just of violence but of pregnancy complications, miscarriage, premature birth, and even death.  

Even before this war began, UNICEF estimated that 40% of doctors and 30% of midwives left Lebanon between 2019 and 2021, and as a result, nearly three times as many women have died of complications from pregnancy or childbirth than in years past. 

Learning from Experience 

This reality is not abstract to me. It’s deeply connected to my identity and my family’s story. 

My family is originally from Syria, a country shaped by years of conflict and displacement. I carry with me the stories of a homeland disrupted, where hospitals were destroyed, and where something as fundamental as a safe birth could no longer be taken for granted. I know first-hand how serious complications during pregnancy and childbirth can be, and how dependent survival is on access to timely, quality care. I’ve seen how, in these environments, women often come last, prioritizing their children and their families, while their own health is deferred—sometimes fatally.

These experiences did not just shape my understanding of crisis, they shaped my sense of responsibility to respond to it. I have dedicated my career to the humanitarian sector, and I believe that our collective approach to humanitarian work—both in and outside of conflict zones—must center mothers, children, and communities in a direct way.

That’s why a few years ago I started Every Pregnancy, a partner-driven initiative dedicated to saving the lives of mothers and babies around the world. We see ourselves not just as an organization, but as a rethinking of how we mobilize resources and who we trust to lead.

Over the years running Every Pregnancy and working with partners protecting women and children across natural disasters and conflict settings, we’ve built a roadmap for what it takes to re-design aid models to truly serve and protect communities in need. 

Letting Communities Lead

The first step is to see communities not as recipients of aid, but as architects of solutions. 

Traditional aid models concentrate power and decision-making far from the people most affected. This legacy of oppression results in inefficiencies, misaligned priorities, and expensive aid responses. But frontline, locally-rooted organizations know their communities best because they’re part of them. We must invest in their leadership and trust them to lead humanitarian responses. 

The data is clear: locally led humanitarian response improves the coverage, speed, and efficiency of healthcare in conflict and displacement settings. So if you’re compelled to support humanitarian efforts, I encourage you to prioritize local organizations, where your funds can go further. 

Not Sacrificing Quality

While care in these contexts may look different, redesigning aid models also means improving the quality of care in humanitarian settings. Because communities living in humanitarian settings deserve the same quality of care as any other population.

Take the example of MedGlobal, a humanitarian partner delivering healthcare in conflict settings, including in Lebanon. Amid the escalating violence, MedGlobal alongside the ministry of health, deployed mobile clinics to reach displaced populations spread out across shelters. 

These mobile clinics are anything but basic. MedGlobal’s mobile unit is outfitted with best-in-class maternal care – from portable ultrasounds that monitor baby’s health to innovative E-MOTIVE bundles to protect women from excessive bleeding during birth. MedGlobal’s example shows that even in the most challenging of circumstances, women deserve quality care, and local teams are best positioned to deliver it. 

Catalytic Approach

The final step in redesigning aid models is to take collective action. 

The humanitarian sector has long understood that bringing local and international partners together reduces redundancies, unlocks capacity, and maximizes resources. That’s why humanitarian responses are often collaborations among many actors. So why are partners still fundraising on their own?

At Every Pregnancy we decided to adopt a different approach to fundraising. Every Ramadan, we bring our coalition of 50+ partners onto a shared platform where they mobilize their own communities, tell their own stories, and raise funds for the care they are already delivering. Unlike typical funding platforms, we use pooled funding and an equitable distribution model that allows us to amplify what our partners built, unlocking even greater impact. 

I’m proud to say that by working together this Ramadan we raised more than $91 million, more than any single organization would’ve been able to achieve on their own. 

Every Pregnancy’s story is proof of what’s possible when we shift the paradigm from dependency to dignity. When communities are given the tools, trust, and resources, they lead, they innovate, and they sustain solutions far beyond what any top-down system could design. 

Imagine if we applied the same collaborative approach to any humanitarian response – how much more generosity could we unlock, how much more could humanitarian partners achieve, how many more communities could we serve?

If we continue to design systems that overlook mothers, children, and communities especially in crisis, we will continue to fail them. But if we invest in models that center dignity, proximity, and collective action, we can fundamentally change outcomes.