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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsU.S. Maternal Death Rate Now Highest In The Western World, Thanks To GOP War On Women
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2015/06/08/u-s-maternal-death-rate-now-highest-in-the-western-world-thanks-to-gop-war-on-women/According to the latest State of the Worlds Mothers report, released in May, 2015, the U.S. has the highest rate of maternal death in any western nation. Women in the U.S. are ten times more likely to die from pregnancy as women living in Poland or Norway. Compared to women living in Belarus, the country with the lowest rate of maternal deaths, women in the U.S. are twenty times more likely to die before, during, or immediately after childbirth.
Globally, the rate of maternal deaths has been steadily declining over the past two decades. Around the world, the rate of maternal deaths has been reduced by 45 percent since the mid-1990s. Meanwhile, a womans risk of death from pregnancy in the U.S. today is double what it was a decade and a half ago.
It gets worse, though. The rate of maternal deaths in the United States is calculated according to the number of deaths reported annually. According to a report published by the US National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health, at least 38 percent of pregnancy-related deaths are not reported as such in the United States. Research also estimates that at least half of all maternal deaths are not listed as maternal deaths on the death certificate in cases where the fetus was not delivered, when a woman died more than a week after delivery, or in cases where a woman died from a condition that existed before pregnancy, which was worsened because of pregnancy.
JustAnotherGen
(31,902 posts)noiretextatique
(27,275 posts)and directly attributable to republicons
ismnotwasm
(42,014 posts)So messed up.
Comrade Grumpy
(13,184 posts)ismnotwasm
(42,014 posts)calimary
(81,500 posts)Wounded Bear
(58,713 posts)In part it is just a reflection of profitizing our entire medical system and turning it into an industry. All care is declining, I think.
But the specific attacks on womens' right and access to care is especially deplorable.
Puzzledtraveller
(5,937 posts)maternity and paternity for that matter, it's the purview of the corporate overlords. I know that's not what the OP is about but just taking the point further.
awoke_in_2003
(34,582 posts)lark
(23,156 posts)I lived in CA when I was having children (thankfully!!). There you got 6 weeks paid maternity leave from the state (not the corp.) and 8 weeks for C-sections or other complications. This was prior to FMLA. In FL, you get no paid time at all, just the FMLA benefit of being able to be off without pay. It's also all done through the employer, the state is totally uninvolved.
Another thing, the US poverty level has gone way up and lots of women can't afford children or medical care. I thought Medicaid covered people who made less than the FPL, but that's not true. Each state can set their own limit. All states in the south only accept people for Medicaid with incomes that are a FRACTION of FPL. I was looking at a chart recently, and in AL (if I remember correctly) anyone with a family of 4 who made more than $9,000 a year wouldnt qualify for Medicaid. Of course, these are all states that have rejected the ACA, so their empoverished citizens get little if any help at all. Also, a lot of these states have also made it very difficult to have abortions, even when the mother's health will suffer. You can bet the underreporting of maternal deaths is deliberate to cover up the states fault in creating these conditions. Nothing to see here folks, move on.
City Lights
(25,171 posts)hifiguy
(33,688 posts)pursued in this so "exceptional" country. Sickening.
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)valerief
(53,235 posts)marym625
(17,997 posts)B2G
(9,766 posts)It has a lot to do with women deferring pregnancy to when they're older, which can result in complications like to hypertension and gestational diabetes.
If anything, it points to a lack of prenatal care of lower income women which results in high risk pregnancies for both mother and child.
Unknown Beatle
(2,672 posts)As a matter of fact, abortions represent a small percentage of what PP does. The repugs just didn't restrict abortion, they want to close all PPs in the country.
Planned Parenthood is about birth control and a woman's reproductive well-being, including education, prenatal care and mammograms. Without these, of course the Maternal Death rate is going to go up.
LanternWaste
(37,748 posts)In fact, only three percent of all Planned Parenthood health services are abortion services, while 80 percent of their clients receive services to prevent unintended pregnancy in addition to educational programs, 400,000 pap smears and 500,000 breast exams each year.
LanternWaste
(37,748 posts)"This can't be blamed significantly on abortion restrictions..."
What are the objective sources for those allegations leading to your conclusion?
B2G
(9,766 posts)The reasons for the overall increase in pregnancy-related mortality are unclear. The use of computerized data linkages by the states, changes in the way causes of death are coded, and the addition of a pregnancy checkbox to the death certificate in many states have likely improved identification of pregnancy-related deaths over time. Whether the actual risk of a woman dying from pregnancy-related causes has increased is unclear. Many studies show that an increasing number of pregnant women in the United States have chronic health conditions such as hypertension,1 diabetes,2 and chronic heart disease.3 These conditions may put a pregnant woman at higher risk of pregnancy complications. Although the overall risk of dying from pregnancy complications is low, some women are at a higher risk than others. The higher pregnancy-related mortality ratios during 2009-2011 compared to 2006-2008 are due to an increase in infection and sepsis deaths. Variability in the risk of death by race, ethnicity, and age indicates that more can be done to understand and reduce pregnancy-related deaths.
http://www.cdc.gov/reproductivehealth/maternalinfanthealth/pmss.html
spooky3
(34,481 posts)Your first point. The CDC does not present comparative data (vs other countries) and specifically states that the reasons for the recent uptick are unclear and more research is needed.
B2G
(9,766 posts)Statistics for 40 states and the District of Columbia, gleaned from death certificates, indicate that whereas the reported maternal mortality rate from 1999 to 2002 was 9.8 per 100,000 live births, it jumped to 20.8 per 100,000 live births for the period 2010 to 2013. But the numbers in the latter period may have been affected by a small change in the forms that are filed when a person dies. Until relatively recently most states relied on a death certificate form that was created in 1989. A newer version of the form, released in 2003, added a dedicated question asking whether the person who died was currently or recently pregnanteffectively creating a flag for capturing maternal mortality. Specifically, this recently introduced question asks if the woman was pregnant within the past year, at the time of death or within 42 days of death.
The addition of this question means that the apparent increase in maternal mortality in the U.S. is almost certainly not a real increase. Its better detection from the new certificates, says Robert Anderson, chief of the Mortality Statistics Branch with the CDCs National Center for Health Statistics. The numbers are going up but its most likely not because women are more likely to die, he contends. (Andersons branch of CDC counts maternal mortality as death during pregnancy or in the following 42 days; some other researchers look at the whole year after giving birth.) States have been slow to switch over to the new form and even now two statesAlabama and West Virginiastill have not adopted it. But as the certificate with the check box is being implemented over time, we are detecting more maternal deaths, Anderson says. Another administrative change in how deaths were classified and coded internationally, called the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, 10th Edition (ICD-10), is also widely believed to be a contributing factor to the uptick in death numbers.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/has-maternal-mortality-really-doubled-in-the-u-s/
spooky3
(34,481 posts)But then you need proof that the other develop countries did not have the same situation. And why are our mothers dieing at a higher rate than other developed nations? The argument only accounts for an increase and does not account for the high rate in comparison to other countries.
Restricting access to both abortions and birth control could cause an increase. Women waiting to an older age, illnesses that make pregnancy more dangerous And other variables also occur in other developed nations.Though routinely bad health care for women, especially poor woman, is peculiar to the US.
B2G
(9,766 posts)In the article I referenced above, death certificates now ask if a woman has been pregnant within the last year. If it's checked, are those deaths being included in the statistics?
Do other countries use the same criteria?
spooky3
(34,481 posts)Assertion in the first pgh.
I have seen data supporting the second--that better access to health care (and contraception) for lower income women in other developed countries accounts for at least some of the difference.
Do you think that people are not deferring pregnancies in other developed countries ranking above the U.S.?
B2G
(9,766 posts)In the United States
Of the 1,751 deaths within a year of pregnancy termination that occurred in 2011 and were reported to CDC, 702 were found to be pregnancy-related. The pregnancy-related mortality ratio was 17.8 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2011.
Considerable racial disparities in pregnancy-related mortality exist. In 2011, the pregnancy-related mortality ratios were
12.5 deaths per 100,000 live births for white women.
42.8 deaths per 100,000 live births for black women.
17.3 deaths per 100,000 live births for women of other races.
http://www.cdc.gov/reproductivehealth/maternalinfanthealth/pmss.html
valerief
(53,235 posts)We're number one!
Of course, this will be brushed aside or if mentioned at all, glossed over by our media.
Puzzledtraveller
(5,937 posts)Perhaps I have been spared the extremes, even my republican parents are seemingly very moderate.
valerief
(53,235 posts)Puzzledtraveller
(5,937 posts)Maybe its a defense mechanism, to block out the crazy.
Dont call me Shirley
(10,998 posts)KansDem
(28,498 posts)Regressicans
valerief
(53,235 posts)Aerows
(39,961 posts)and thought better of it, because while it would be apt, I'd get into trouble.
Heaven for fend a woman have autonomy over her own body. That just should never happen.
awoke_in_2003
(34,582 posts)I like it- I may have to steal that.
valerief
(53,235 posts)niyad
(113,576 posts)and their doctors, and have a god-given right to interfere)
stevenleser
(32,886 posts)tanyev
(42,618 posts)Response to KamaAina (Original post)
Post removed
KamaAina
(78,249 posts)Hekate
(90,824 posts)KamaAina
(78,249 posts)PADemD
(4,482 posts)B2G
(9,766 posts)PADemD
(4,482 posts)They sometimes take weeks to drain.
sabrina 1
(62,325 posts)government into addressing this immediately. It IS an issue of national security unlike the phony wars we are engaged in all over the world.
Maybe now that we have better relations with Cuba women can become refugees there and get the care they need. Cuba has an excellent and free health system with a low infant mortality rate.
Shame on this country.
Stargazer99
(2,599 posts)Doctor_J
(36,392 posts)Bernardo de La Paz
(49,043 posts)hunter
(38,328 posts)It's a developing country with the biggest military, prison system, banking system, and THE BOMB.
We are not a first world Western democracy like Canada or Western Europe.
Much of the poverty and despair is hidden away from the wealthy classes. They simply don't see it.
Our medical system isn't all that great either. Even wealthy people get inappropriate, expensive, and dangerous medical care.
Doctors who cater to the wealthy often give their customers what they demand, not what is most appropriate and least likely to cause harm.
Look what happened to Michael Jackson or Joan Rivers.
Initech
(100,104 posts)And I'm a guy too. I think it's disgusting when birth control for women is seen as the absolute worst thing in the world, yet Viagra is advertised literally every 30 seconds. I mean... what the serious fuck?
xocet
(3,873 posts)DamnYankeeInHouston
(1,365 posts)She will have a much more civilized life there.
KamaAina
(78,249 posts)DamnYankeeInHouston
(1,365 posts)My mother used to return my letters with the spelling corrected. I had to keep a box of stickers for second grade students who found my errors with great glee. Some of the parents were sure I misspelled words on purpose to teach proofreading.
raouldukelives
(5,178 posts)hrmjustin
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