Many of Zimbabwe's pregnant women and their unborn babies are facing an almost certain death, after the country's only two government maternity hospitals in Harare have been closed.

Most hospitals across the country have been turning away the sick and injured and the majority of government institutions and local clinics have closed their doors. Public health workers have said there is a critical lack of medicine, equipment, services and staff, and the closures are resulting in preventable deaths. This means there is no access to care for those who cannot afford private clinics.

The latest blow to the already beaten health system is the closure of the maternity hospitals that offer lifesaving surgical and emergency obstetric care. The Zimbabwe Association of Doctors for Human Rights (ZADHR) on Thursday said the closure "will result in the unnecessary deaths of many other healthy women and an even larger number of infants."

Its believed that an average of 3000 women deliver their babies per month in public hospitals in greater Harare and between 250 and 300 of these women require lifesaving caesarian sections. ZADHR said that many more have deliveries assisted by forceps or vacuum extraction, when their babies show signs of distress and a lack of oxygen. The association also explained that mothers who miscarry earlier in pregnancy require surgery to evacuate the uterus to avoid serious and often fatal infections and bleeding.

ZADHR said in Thursday's statement that fatalities are not the only concern of the closure of the hospitals, saying there will likely be "a dramatic increase in the number of stillbirths and of infants who will suffer irreversible brain damage which will result in cerebral palsy and severe mental retardation." The association has called for the immediate establishment of a temporary facility at one of the main maternity hospitals in Harare capable of providing emergency obstetric care, including caesarian Section, for the indigent population.

Meanwhile international organisation, Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) has called for an international crisis response to Zimbabwe's collapsed health system to prevent more unnecessary death in the country. The group said on Thursday that unless the United Nations and individual governments provide a 'robust and immediate response', massive loss of life will occur.

Frank Donaghue, from PHR, who recently returned from Zimbabwe, said on Thursday that the health situation there is 'untenable'. He said the international community, particularly the US and British government's, need to take the lead in urging international response to the crisis in Zimbabwe. He added that without this kind of response "thousands of people will be dead by the end of this year."

The group has launched an online petition calling for international support for the call for a crisis response, available on www.physiciansforhumanrights.org