Updated episode: In Mozambique, where doctors are in short supply, a bold grassroots initiative is training midwives in advanced life-saving surgery.

News and Documentary Emmy Award nomination

In sub-Saharan Africa, where doctors are in short supply, a woman's chances of dying in childbirth are a shocking 1 in 22. But in Mozambique, a midwife named Emilia Cumbane is doing something radical to stem the trend. She is part of an extraordinary grassroots initiative in which midwives, otherwise untrained in conventional medicine, are learning to perform advanced life-saving surgery. Among the first of its kind in the world, Cumbane's program may offer a working alternative to the life-threatening lack of doctors in other developing countries. In this 2009 update, WIDE ANGLE host Aaron Brown travels to a rural hospital in Mozambique to meet with Cumbane to see how both she and the program are faring.