Georgia officials fire all members of maternal mortality committee

Officials at the Georgia Department of Public Health fired all members of the Maternal Mortality Review Committee (MMRC) on Nov. 8 after an internal investigation failed to determine which of the committee’s members had leaked documents to the press. News of the committee’s dismissal was first published by ProPublica on Thursday.
Findings from the committee were a central part of a September ProPublica series which alleged that the deaths of two Georgia women — Amber Nicole Thurman and Candi Miller — were preventable and allegedly linked to Georgia’s six-week abortion ban. 
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The committee, which is composed of doctors, nurses, public health workers and epidemiologists, is responsible for identifying and investigating maternal deaths in Georgia and formulating solutions to reduce maternal mortality rates. Georgia law stipulates that the MMRC’s work is confidential and prohibits members of the committee from sharing their findings with the public. 
ProPublica’s coverage, which was based in large part on leaked findings from the committee, reported that Thurman, a 28-year-old medical assistant and a single mother of a 6-year-old boy, died after her doctors were forced to delay treatment for 20 hours as she battled a deadly infection.
Miller, who was 41, also died after she reportedly delayed seeking care due to fears over anti-abortion legislation.
Thurman and Miller were also both women of color in a state where Black women are more than three times as likely to die from pregnancy-related complications than white women, according to a 2023 study published in BMC Public Health. 
The stories became a central focus of Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign as she sought to link restrictive abortion bans to President-elect Donald Trump. 
More:Kamala Harris addresses abortion bans, reproductive rights at Atlanta rally
“Under the Trump abortion ban, her doctors could have faced up to a decade in prison for providing Amber the care she needed,” Harris said at a reproductive rights rally in Atlanta days after the articles were published. “Understand what a law like this means: Doctors have to wait until the patient is at death’s door before they take action.” 
A 2023 report from the Georgia Department of Public Health revealed that 89% of pregnancy-related deaths in Georgia had at least some chance of being prevented. 
In response to the article, officials from Georgia’s Department of Public Health launched an investigation to try and determine how confidential findings from the MMRC had been divulged to the press. However, in a Nov. 8 letter addressed to the committee, Public Health Commissioner Kathleen Toomey announced that an internal investigation was unable to determine who had leaked the findings, and that all members of the committee would be replaced. 
“Therefore, effective immediately the current MMRC is disbanded, and all member seats will be filled through a new application process,” Toomey wrote. “Additionally, other procedures for on-boarding committee members better ensuring confidentiality, committee oversight and MMRC organizational structure will be evaluated for possible modifications.” 
A spokesperson for the Georgia Department of Public Health provided a copy of the letter but declined to comment further. Gov. Brian Kemp’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 
Maya Homan is a 2024 election fellow at USA TODAY who focuses on Georgia politics. She is @MayaHoman on X, formerly Twitter.