Infant mortality rose sharply in the United States, notably due to birth defects, in the months following the Supreme Court’s revocation of the federal guarantee of the right to abortion, according to a new study released Monday.
Ending half a century of jurisprudence in June 2022, the Supreme Court, with a conservative majority since the appointment of three judges by Donald Trump, gave the federated states full latitude to legislate in this area.
At least 20 of them have since put in place partial or total restrictions on voluntary termination of pregnancy.
The subject occupies an important place in the presidential campaign, two weeks before the election in the United States. On November 5, the Americans will also vote on the guarantee by the States of the right to abortion in no less than ten of them.
This new study, led by Maria Gallo and Parvati Singh of Ohio University and published in the journal JAMA Pediatrics, analyzes a national database and its results on the consequences of restrictions on abortion are consistent with those of studies published earlier this year on the only state of Texas, where abortion is now prohibited, including in cases of incest or rape.
In the months following the Supreme Court’s decision, “infant mortality in the United States has been higher than we expected,” with national numbers usually being fairly stable with peaks and valleys. troughs linked to predictable seasonal effects, Maria Gallo, professor of epidemiology specializing in reproductive health, explains to AFP.
In October 2022, March 2023 and April 2023, infant mortality rates were 7% higher than usual nationally, with 247 additional deaths for each of these months. The majority of these deaths were attributed to congenital anomalies.
“These are cases in which, before the Supreme Court’s decision, it would have been possible to abort rather than carry the pregnancy to term and have to witness the death of your child,” underlines Maria Gallo.
The next step for researchers will be to establish whether this increase was observed in all states or whether it was concentrated in states that restricted access to abortion.
“There is a broader human toll to consider, including the mental health consequences of being denied an abortion or being forced to carry a pregnancy to term when the fetus has a fatal birth defect,” adds Parvati Singh.
