Infant mortality has risen sharply in the U.S., particularly due to birth defects, in the months since the Supreme Court struck down the federal guarantee of abortion rights, according to a new study released Monday, leaving only two weeks until the presidential elections in the country.
Ending this right, recognized for half a century by women, in June 2022, the Supreme Court, with a clear conservative majority following the appointments of three justices by former President Donald Trump (2017-2021), gave the states the jurisdiction to legislate on this particular issue.
At least twenty of them have since imposed severe restrictions or outright bans on abortion procedures.
The issue occupies, to a remarkable extent, this year’s election campaign. On November 5th, American men and women are also called to decide on the guarantee of the right to abortion in no less than ten states.
The new study, by Ohio State University’s Maria Gallo and Parvati Singh and published online in the journal JAMA Pediatrics (“National Trends in Infant Mortality in the US After Dobbs“), analyzes database data on the consequences of abortion restrictions.
The findings are consistent with two other studies published earlier this year, exclusive to the state of Texas, where abortion is now outlawed, even in cases where the pregnancy is the result of incest or rape.
In the months following the Supreme Court decision, “child mortality in the US was much higher than we would have expected”, said Maria Gallo, a professor of epidemiology specializing in reproductive health.
The next stage
In October 2022, March 2023 and April 2023, the child mortality rate was 7% higher than usual nationally, with 247 extra deaths in each of those months. In the majority of them, the deaths were attributed to congenital anomalies.
These are “cases in which, before the decision of the Supreme Court, it would have been possible to have abortions rather than complete the pregnancy and (the parents) experience the death of their child.
The next stage for the two researchers will be to ascertain whether this increase was observed in all states, or was concentrated in those that imposed restrictions on access to abortion.
