“My husband and I agreed to use family planning and not have more kids, but he was pressured by our family and I got pregnant again,” said Ahlam, a mother of two in Yemen, earlier this year. When she went into labour, she was forced to travel almost eight hours to give birth.

Kate Opio, 33, was buoyant, cuddling one of her newborn twins in the maternity ward at Inomo health centre, in Uganda’s Apac District. The other twin slept peacefully beside them. But this lovely moment, Ms. Opio’s midwife explained, almost didn’t happen.