Why do black American women die at nearly 3 times (3 x) the rate as white American women in childbirth? In 2021 69.9 deaths per 100,000 live births (black) versus 26.6 for whites; in 21st century USA?
Why? What are contributing factors? Is there a deadly differential for healthcare for black women & must we be alarmed? I say YES! Marginalization, racial discrimination, financial barriers?
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hestat/maternal-mortality/2021/maternal-mortality-rates-2021.htm#Table
This report updates a previous one that showed maternal mortality rates for 2018–2020 (2). In 2021, 1,205 women died of maternal causes in the United States compared with 861 in 2020 and 754 in 2019 (2). The maternal mortality rate for 2021 was 32.9 deaths per 100,000 live births, compared with a rate of 23.8 in 2020 and 20.1 in 2019 (Table).
In 2021, the maternal mortality rate for non-Hispanic Black (subsequently, Black) women was 69.9 deaths per 100,000 live births, 2.6 times the rate for non-Hispanic White (subsequently, White) women (26.6) (Figure 1 and Table). Rates for Black women were significantly higher than rates for White and Hispanic women. The increases from 2020 to 2021 for all race and Hispanic-origin groups were significant.’
Why? One thing is for sure. It's not because white heterosexual conservative Christians have done anything wrong. White heterosexual conservative Christians are a noble people, the salt of the earth The reason why black American women die at nearly 3 times the rate of white American women is partly atleast perhaps because there are r/K differences within as well as between species including humans. Human groups, like species, that are r-selected exhibit higher mortality across the life span.
"What is r and K reproductive strategy?
For r-selected species, reproduction results in a large number of offspring that receive little care from parents and exhibit a high mortality rate. For K-selected species, reproduction results in only a few offspring which all receive a higher level of care and have a higher chance of survival.
What are K and r-selected species?
K-selected species are those that are larger, have long lifespans, produce few young at a time, and exhibit logistic growth. R-selected species are those that have shorter lifespans, are generally smaller, produce many young, and exhibit exponential growth."
R-Selected vs. K-Selected Species | Overview & Population Growth
https://study.com/academy/lesson/graphing-population-growth-of-r-selected-k-selected-species.html#:~:text=K%2Dselected%20species%20are%20those,young%2C%20and%20exhibit%20exponential%20growth.
Obviously, electing Joe Biden didn’t help.
Seriously, out of wedlock pregnancies, teens pregnancies, older maternal age pregnancies, substance abuse, domestic violence, poorer nutritional status, gestational diabetes, pregnancy induced hypertension, to name a few things. Access to care, personal decisions about seeking care.
It would be instructive to break these figures down by various socioeconomic factors & compare races stratified by those categories, and see what discrepancies persist when controlling for age, income, marital status, number of abortions, number of pregnancies, pregnancy intervals, comorbidities, geographic location(urban/rural), region of the country, etc.
No one seems to look past crude racial differences to see if it is truly race or some other factor or a combination of both (Oh, and also compare native born to illegal & legal immigrants status)
Complex problems, not necessarily amenable to simple solutions.
I looked into this earlier in my career, when I was doing OB.