In 2016, the United States quartet of Tianna Bartoletta, Allyson Felix, English Gardner and Tori Bowie won gold in the 4x100-meter relay in the Rio Games. Since then, three of those four women experienced complications during their respective pregnancies, leading to grave health situations for babies and mothers.
Bowie’s were fatal, according to an autopsy report revealed this week.
These are three women — Bartoletta (who has since divorced and returned to using her maiden name, Madison), Felix and Bowie — whose fame and physical health, as well as any financial prosperity, couldn’t save them from the troubling statistical realities of being Black and pregnant in the United States.