Steve Chapman looks at one of the bigger question marks in the debate over health care in the United States: why such a high infant mortality rate?
The American medical system has the latest technology, the greatest variety of new drugs, and unparalleled resources. But anyone who thinks we’re getting something great for our dollars inevitably encounters a two-word rebuke: infant mortality.
The United States is the richest nation on Earth, but it comes in 29th in the world in survival rates among babies. This mediocre ranking is supposed to make an irrefutable case for health care reform. If we cared enough to insure everyone, we are told, we would soon rise to the health standards of other modern nations. It’s just a matter of getting over our weird resistance to a bigger government role in medical care.
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No one denies the problem. Our infant mortality rate is double that of Japan or Sweden. But we live different lives, on average, than people in those places. We suffer more obesity (about 10 times as much as the Japanese), and we have more births to teenagers (seven times more than the Swedes). Nearly 40 percent of American babies are born to unwed mothers.
Factors like these are linked to low birth weight in babies, which is a dangerous thing. In a 2007 study for the National Bureau of Economic Research, economists June O’Neill and Dave O’Neill noted that “a multitude of behaviors unrelated to the health care system such as substance abuse, smoking and obesity” are connected “to the low birth weight and preterm births that underlie the infant death syndrome.”
