Download Healthy Women, Healthy Babies

Healthy Women, Healthy
Babies
Jeffrey Levi, PhD
Executive Director
Trust for America’s Health
General Overview
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After 40 years of improvements, infant
mortality rates in the U.S. have stalled since
2000.
Approximately 30 percent of women who
give birth have some form of pregnancy
complication.
In 2005, the annual costs (medical,
educational and lost productivity) of preterm
birth in the U.S. were at least $26.2 billion.
Health Disparities
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Significant disparities exist among ethnic and
racial groups in the U.S.
In 2005, black babies were dying at twice the
rate of white infants in their first year of life
AND
African American women had 13.6 lowbirthweight babies per 1,000 births, compared
to 7.3 low-birthweight babies per 1,000 births
for white women.
What’s the reason for these poor birth
outcomes?
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The health of childbearing aged women is starting to
get worse, especially among low-income women.
Increasing evidence is showing that how healthy a
woman is before she becomes pregnant has a great
impact on the health of the baby and whether there is
an increased risk for infant death or birth defects.
Prematurity and low-birthweight rates are associated
with health issues in the mother, such as diabetes,
high blood pressure or obesity.
What can be done to address this problem?
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We must improve preconception health and health care for all
women of childbearing age, as nearly half of all pregnancies
in the U.S. are unintended.
Specifically, we can:
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Fully implement and enhance Medicaid policies and give states the
option to cover low-income adult women without needing a waiver.
Fully fund other programs that provide primary care and other
services to women of childbearing, such as the Healthy Start
Program, community health centers, Title X family planning and
HRSA’s Maternal and Child Health Block grant.
Make research on preconception health & health care a priority.
What can be done to address this problem?
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We must also improve the environment in which we
all live to ensure better access to venues for physical
activity and nutritious foods.
As a nation, we tend to over-medicalize health
problems. Given the state of today’s science,
medicine can only address the consequences of poor
health, not prevent it.
Real prevention requires changing the communities
in we live and approaching this as a communitywide, not just an individual challenge.
What can be done to address this problem?
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TFAH just released a new report, Prevention for a
Healthier America, which examines how much the
country could save by strategically investing in
community disease prevention programs.
It concludes that an investment of $10 per person per
year in proven community-based programs to
increase physical activity, improve nutrition, and
prevent smoking and other tobacco use could save
the country more than $16 billion annually within
five years. This is a return of $5.60 for every $1.
Conclusion
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To improve the health of women, babies and all
Americans, we need a cultural shift, one in which
healthy environments, physical activity and healthy
eating become the norm. We know that even small
changes can make a big difference in people’s health.
We need to build strong communities that provide all
Americans with access to physical activity and
nutritious options so that we can all make healthy
choices.