Black women founders offer health tech solutions to combat Black maternal mortality

When Black people receive maternal care, they are often not treated the same as white people. In 2016, when Simmone Taitt had her first pregnancy loss, she was very well insured, had a high-paying job as a tech executive, and had access to one of the top OB-GYNs in New York City. Yet, when she found out that her baby had no heartbeat, she left that appointment with no medical follow-up, and no emotional or mental health support. “And I did what 85% of all Americans do. I went to Dr. Google and there is where I found things, very simple things that weren’t offered to me,” said Taitt, the founder and CEO of Poppy Seed Health, on Thursday at the STAT Breakthrough Summit West in San Francisco. Taitt eventually quit her job, became a doula, and started Poppy Seed Health to deliver on-demand emotional and mental health support for birthing people. advertisement “You see three Black women here today, and I can tell you that it’s our lived experiences that sent us into the realm of starting and building a solution to solve something very personal for us, but also for generations in front of us,” said Taitt, about...