For thousands of years， the major cause of premature
death among women stemmed directly from pregnancy.
As late as the eighteenth century， epidemics of so-called
childbirth fever in Paris and Vienna--among the most
sophisticated of cities--killed at least one in five women
who conceived. Not until the mid-nineteenth century，
under the leadership of Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis， were med-
ical students instructed in such rudimentary hygiene as
washing their hands before participating in a delivery. It
took another twenty years for the medical profession to
finally accept Dr. Semmelweis s theory that unsterile
hands transmitted infection in the deliver)， room. Even
so， countless people throughout the centuries， and even
well into this one， went directly from milking cows to
delivering babies without a thought of the inevitable in-
fection that would follow. Today， thankfully， maternal
death during childbirth is exceedingly rare in developed
nations.
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