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Could you explain or link to the "different reporting standard" between USA and everyone else for infant mortality please?
by Andaith 5y ago
Could you explain or link to the "different reporting standard" between USA and everyone else for infant mortality please?
- tacitusarc 5y agohttps://vitalrecord.tamhsc.edu/american-infant-mortality-rates-high/ https://vitalrecord.tamhsc.edu/american-infant-mortality-rat...
- HWR_14 5y agoOh sure. At a high level (and I'm not super well versed), infant mortality statistics are only based on live births. In the US, this includes any baby that breaths or otherwise shows any sign of life. In several other countries (including western european ones), the check for signs of life doesn't happen immediately. There's also the question of if countries mark extremely premature births (<22 weeks) as live births or miscarriages. It's a politically charged issue, because many people consider it to be the loss of a child, and no doctor wants to tell them the child was never born. Since 2001, France has more than doubled the number of stillbirths, because of new standards that moved what were once miscarriages to the stillbirth category (some driven locally, some in response to new WHO standards based on the ability to care for premature infants.) It's also politically charged because many groups have a vested interest in downplaying any results that make their country look bad. I'm not going to claim it's entirely a statistical artifact - the US lacks comprehensive neonatal care and that's an issue.