Yeah.

Ria, I started as a doctor.

I trained in India.

I've been working with international global health agencies for over two decades.

And one of the things, mostly in the space of reproductive health, children and anyone who's worked in reproductive health will tell you that education, water sanitation, hygiene, climate change, finance, sustainable agriculture...

All of them are so interrelated.

So if when you do work in reproductive health amongst the world's most vulnerable populations, you have no choice but to work in these other sectors.

So talk to me a little bit about what it is exactly that you do for these high net worth individuals with these families so that we can understand the It's not just as simple as, oh, give money here and here, but actually there's a process.

Does violence against women look different across cultures or does the control is always the same? Ah.

The cage is always the same.

And that's the sad part.

I want to say, when we speak about violence against women, let's be clear about one thing.

It doesn't necessarily mean just raising a hand against a woman.

Violence against women has taken different forms across different generations.

It includes anything to do with female genital mutilation, domestic violence as we know it, abuse, which is hitting, kicking, termination of pregnancies, violence.

I would love to hear how does your approach differ from the approach of other traditional philanthropic institutions?

True.

It's not a personality type.

When you advocate for your own wellness, wellness, right, and you stop calling wellness as self-love, going for a therapeutic lymphatic massage after your mastectomy as self-love, that is not, that is, that is you advocating for your health.

It is not self-love, and I think there has to be a distinction between that.

Self-love is you wanting to pamper yourself.

Fantastic.

But then when your body asks for more, you listen to it, and you go find ways and means in which you can advocate for yourself.

Mm-hmm.

So I, I would just love to start with a little bit about you and your personal background and journey, and how it sort of led you into the current workspace that you're in.

Hi, Ally.

Um, thank you so much for having me.

Um, one of the things that I keep coming back to is the arc, um, on the field.

I'm very well known as a doctor who makes candles.

Um, but [laughs] off the field, um, I trained as a doctor in India.

Um, uh, my medical education was in India and in the United States.

Okay.

Do you want to speak on what happens after delivery and some of the challenges worldwide that we're facing?

So postpartum hemorrhage is probably one of the most leading causes of death for mothers.

We have had hypertensive disorders, preeclampsia, hemorrhage, sepsis, obstructed labor, complications from unsafe abortions.

none of them are mysteries but postpartum hemorrhage is like the world's leading killer for mothers we've had the drug but since 1906 i believe it's oxytocin but the reason why women still die from it in 2026 is because it's not because we don't have the drug it's because of system inequities and the clinic just doesn't have power to keep the drug cold or the clinic doesn't access to the power or almost always there are no deciding factors or like a curriculum, if you must, for a physician or the nurse practitioner or the doula or the midwife seeing the patient to administer the drug in a timely manner.

And all of this is influenced by literacy, the women's autonomy in the household, what prior facility experiences they've had, how traumatic or respectful they were, what was the cost of the drug itself, but also the cost of the clinic visit to the household, and whether there were warning signs recognized in advance or not.

And I think dignity-first care and a community of health workers matter enormously at those point of times.

A skilled traditional birth attendant who has been trained to recognize these danger signs and comes from that trusted community also help in bringing those things down.

Yeah, it certainly is something that seems to be on the forefront of people's minds now with groups like March of Dimes, for example, advocating and organizations, consultants like yourself who are speaking out worldwide about the issues facing maternal mortality, infant mortality, and maternal health as a whole.