Infant mortality

Infant mortality is the "rate of deaths occurring in the first year of life". (reference for quote: Medline-Plus Medical dictionary (an on line service of the U.S. National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health). That rate is calculated by taking the number of infants who perish in a given population over a period of time, as compared to all infants in the population. Since death in infancy is never normal, death rates of infants are used as evidence of detrimental conditions.

These conditions can be medical diagnoses in the infants. If infants with a particular diagnosis have a high death rate, that alone is reason to be concerned about such a medical condition in termns of health care.

At present, in stable developed countries, infant mortality is primarily due to: prematurity, birth defects, sudden infant death syndrome, and accidents. In less developed countries without modern health care, infectious causes such as neonatal tetatnus and both bacterial and viral gastrointestinal infections are major causes of infant mortality. In areas of war, natural disaster and extreme poverty, starvation is an underlying cause of infant mortality, making babies less able to recover from infectious diseases or other ailments.

Infant mortality is also an important measure in demographics, and is often referred to by historians, politicians, and civic planners, who use this number as an indicator for the socioeconomic status of a given society.

With technological advances in invitro fertilization and health care, the correlation between wealth, access to health care, and high infant survival rates are not straight-forward for all populations. For example, prematurity and low birth weights are common in multiple births, and these are more common in assisted reproduction. Prematurity and low birth weights are also more common in babies born to mothers who have poor nutrition (starvation) during pregnancy, and to those who smoke tobacco, engage in substance abuse, and neglect to have prenatal care. Selected populations at socioeconomic extremes, then, can be more likely to have a high infant mortality.

Infant mortality as a social indicator

Babies are at high risk when human populations face starvation or the unsanitary conditions produced by overcrowding and poverty, or both. There is an association between poverty and high infant mortality.

Infant mortality in pediatrics

In pediatrics, the death rate of infants is one important measure of the prognosis of a medical diagnosis, and is often cited when physicians analyse childhood diseases and congenital defects.

Unintentional injury and homicide

In the United States, during the years 1999--2002, the injury death rate among infants was 33.7/100,000 population."The three leading mechanisms of unintentional injury death among infants aged <1 year, regardless of race or ethnicity, were suffocation, motor-vehicle (MV)--traffic injury, and drowning.Stephanie J. Bernard, PhD Leonard J. Paulozzi, MD L.J. David Wallace, MSEH (Division of Unintentional Injury Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control) Fatal Injuries Among Children by Race and Ethnicity --- United States, 1999--2002. MMWR May 18, 2007 / Vol. 56 / No. SS--5 [1]

References

Quantifying and explaining changes in geographical inequality of infant mortality in England and Wales since the 1890s International Journal of Population GeographyVolume 7, Issue 1, Date: January/February 2001, Pages: 35-51 P. Congdon, R. M. Campos, S. E. Curtis, H. R. Southall, I. N. Gregory, I. R. Jones

Patterns of infant mortality caused by major congenital anomalies Teratology Volume 61, Issue 5, Date: May 2000, Pages: 342-346 Shi Wu Wen, Shiliang Liu, K.S. Joseph, Jocelyn Rouleau, Alexander Allen

Prematurity at birth: Trends, racial disparities, and epidemiology Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities Research Reviews Volume 8, Issue 4, Date: 2002, Pages: 215-220 Greg R. Alexander, Martha Slay