Health Outcomes: Facts & Figures

The U.S. preterm birth rate increased for the fourth consecutive year to 10.2 percent in 2019, according to the March of Dimes 2020 Report Card on maternal and infant health in the United States. The statistics are worse for moms and babies of color – with the Report Card showing significant racial disparities that cut across maternal and infant health. Women of color are up to 50 percent more likely to give birth preterm, and their children face up to a 130 percent higher infant death rate. Disparities in preterm birth have increased over the past several years in the United States. The disparity ratio for preterm birth, a measure that tracks progress to eliminating racial/ethnic disparities shows that disparities have worsened in recent years by about 5 percent. Additionally, Black and American Indian/Alaskan Native women are up to three times more likely to die from pregnancy related complications compared to White women. 

The Report Card shows that almost 21,500 babies were lost in 2018 compared to 22,341 babies in 2017, a decline of 3.8 percent. Infant mortality rates have declined due to changes in maternal age – including a decline in teen births in the United States – decreases in adult smoking rates and decreases in death from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. The leading causes of infant death include birth defects, preterm birth and low birth weight, maternal complications, and sudden infant death syndrome. 

The Report Card grades the nation, 50 states, the 100 largest cities, and Puerto Rico on rates of preterm birth. Overall preterm birth rates worsened in 39 states and Washington D.C., with eight states—Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, West Virginia—and Puerto Rico earning a failing grade compared to six last year. Between the 2019 and 2020 Report Cards, 25 states and Washington D.C. had worse grades, 23 states and Puerto Rico had grades that stayed the same, and only two states had grades that improved. 

“Although there has been some incremental progress in advancing policies that will address better maternal and infant health care, this progress is not happening quick enough, and is tempered by increasing racial/ethnic health care disparities in preterm birth,” says Stacey D. Stewart, president and CEO of March of Dimes. “At a time of racial awakening in our nation, we must amplify our efforts to decrease deaths and health challenges facing our nation’s moms and babies and enact new policies that support health equity.”

 

Source: March of Dimes