The #IDM2021 Toolkit & Resource Pack is here!

The International Confederation of Midwives (ICM) is proud to celebrate this year’s International Day of the Midwife (IDM) on 5th May 2021 under the theme of “Follow the Data: Invest in Midwives.” We look forward to coming together as a global midwife community to advocate for investment in quality midwifery care around the world, improving sexual, reproductive, maternal, newborn, child and adolescent health in the process. 

As we join midwives from around the world to reflect on the progress made by our profession, this year's theme is timely because IDM will coincide with the launch of the 2021 State of the World's Midwifery (SoWMy) Report. Co-led by UNFPA, WHO and ICM, SoWMy 2021 provides an updated evidence base and detailed analysis on the impact of midwives on maternal and newborn health outcomes and the return on investment in midwives. Through this lens, ICM will lead ongoing and growing efforts to centre midwives as fundamental to improving quality maternal and newborn care, ending preventable maternal and newborn deaths and achieving SDG 3.1 (reduce the global maternal mortality ratio to less than 70 per 100 000 live births by 2030).

On 5th May, visit unfpa.org/sowmy to download the 2021 State of the World’s Midwifery Report  

In the meantime, ICM’s 2021 IDM Toolkit & Resource Pack will help you plan your own celebration on the impact of midwives globally and the need for increased investment in our profession. It contains:  

• Key messages   
• Tips for planning your virtual event or activities   
• Instructions on how you can utilise social media to your advantage  
• Links to downloadable content for you and your association's use, in English, French and Spanish

We invite you to share this resource pack with stakeholders in your country so that more people can mobilise for midwives in 2021 than ever before.  

As the IDM theme suggests, data demonstrating the impact of midwives will be an important component of our advocacy efforts on 5th May. But data is simply a collection of numbers until you create a compelling narrative. Stories connect people, build trust, and encourage meaningful connections. That’s why in the run-up to IDM (and for a week after), we will be asking midwives and midwife-advocates around the world to fill in a short survey and complete one simple sentence/short paragraph — ‘Midwives matter because…’. The responses we collect may be featured on our social media channels, website or newsletter and, most importantly, will be used in our continued advocacy efforts at ICM. So what are you waiting for? Stand up and be counted, and tell us why midwives matter. 

ICM is thrilled to invite you and your members to one of our five IDM Virtual Parties (three in English, one in Spanish and one in French), taking place on International Day of the Midwife (5th May) and scattered across multiple time zones to accommodate the busy schedules of our members.  

The goal of these events is to provide all midwives with a fun and informative outlet to celebrate their profession and connect with their colleagues. Attendees can expect to hear from the President of ICM, Dr. Franka Cadée, as well as select ICM Board Members. Most importantly, midwives who join our IDM celebration will have the opportunity to come prepared to the event with a response to the following statement: “midwives matter because...”. Select midwives will then be able to vocalise their prepared statement during the celebration, which will be recorded and repurposed into an Opening Ceremony video for the Virtual Triennial Congress in June.  

If you’re interested in vocalising your answer to this statement during the event, please see the instructions at the bottom of this invitation. We expect to have many midwives in attendance and can only accommodate remarks from midwives who confirm their interest prior to the event. Midwives who aren’t able to speak during the event will be invited to share their remarks in the chat function of the Zoom platform.  
 
We ask that you register for ONE of the below event slots based on your language preference and time zone: 

As outlined above, we want to provide midwives belonging to ICM Midwives’ Associations with the opportunity to tell us why, in their view, midwives matter. During the event, ICM leadership will pass the speaker over to select midwives, who will then have two minutes to share their remarks. Would you like to be one of these selected midwives? Here’s how to book your slot:  

• Respond to this email before Wednesday, 28th April expressing your interest and sharing the following details:
  • The name of the ICM Midwives’ Association you belong to  
  • The event time slot you selected from the above list  
  • A brief paragraph about how you plan to respond to the statement: “Midwives matter because... when it’s your turn to speak during the event.  

**Please note that we will do our best to accommodate speaking roles for every midwife that expresses an interest in this opportunity, but given the limited time allotted for this event, we will approve expressions of interest on a first-come, first-served basis.