密歇根新闻广播 剖析密歇根乡村和城市的婴儿死亡率

Nearly seven out of every 1,000 babies born in Michigan will not live to their first birthday. That rate is more than double when it comes to African American and Native American infants.

As part of its new effort to move the needle on infant mortality, the state is tailoring solutions to different communities. It recently released a draft of its 2019-2022 Mother Infant Health & Equity¹ Improvement Plan (MIHIEP).

Leseliey Welch is a senior public health lecturer at Wayne State University. She's currently leading the development team for Birth Detroit, a women's wellness and birth center.

Bethany Brown is a certified² nurse midwife and assistant director for the nursing program at Central Michigan University. She's also part of the state's regional infant mortality task force for parts of central Michigan, including Isabella County.

Welch says that in order to address the issue of infant mortality in Detroit which has a rate of 14.2 deaths per 1,000 infants born, it's important to talk about racism³ and the political and socioeconomic conditions that women face.

We know that we need to address the challenges, the larger challenges that families are having. Whether it be around income levels and poverty, whether it is housing, whether it's transportation access, those larger factors complicate⁴ how women are able to access the care that exists, Welch said.

Isabella County in central Michigan had an infant mortality rate of 11.7 per 1,000 births in 2017. That makes it the highest in the state, though Wayne County had the highest number of infant deaths. Brown says that implicit⁵ bias⁶ on the part of health care providers plays a role in the quality of care that different populations in that county receive.

An implicit bias is when a person has these upbringings and beliefs that they may not be completely aware of, and it shapes how we make decisions and care for people, Brown said.

Welch says that the current disparities in both infant and maternal⁷ mortality are rooted in racism, which impacts the resources and opportunities available to women of color. It also impacts the quality of care that they receive from providers, regardless of socioeconomic status or education level.

Brown says that racial and cultural disparities in Isabella County, which is home to the Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe of Michigan, also influences quality of care because providers and patients often come from different backgrounds and may have different priorities.

Both Welch and Brown cite programs that are working to address these issues in their respective communities, including plans for Birth Detroit and for mobile prenatal care or certified nurse midwives in Isabella County.

The state of Michigan has set a target to reach zero preventable infant deaths and zero health disparities among its citizens, a goal that Welch and Brown agree is entirely⁸ possible. Welch says it will require going beyond healthcare to improve people's economic opportunity, improving housing, ensuring pay equity, and affordable⁹ child care.

Those things in combination with improving our care systems and enforcing or promoting standards of respectful care at birth and really leveraging¹⁰ community-based models of care and meeting families where they are, we can absolutely do that, Welch said. There's no reason to think we can't.

This post was written by Stateside production assistant Isabella Isaacs-Thomas.

1 equity   

n.公正，公平，（无固定利息的）股票

参考例句：

• They shared the work of the house with equity.他们公平地分担家务。
• To capture his equity,Murphy must either sell or refinance.要获得资产净值，墨菲必须出售或者重新融资。

2 certified   

a.经证明合格的；具有证明文件的

参考例句：

• Doctors certified him as insane. 医生证明他精神失常。
• The planes were certified airworthy. 飞机被证明适于航行。

3 racism   

n.民族主义；种族歧视(意识)

参考例句：

• He said that racism is endemic in this country.他说种族主义在该国很普遍。
• Racism causes political instability and violence.种族主义道致政治动荡和暴力事件。

4 complicate   

vt.使复杂化，使混乱，使难懂

参考例句：

• There is no need to complicate matters.没有必要使问题复杂化。
• These events will greatly complicate the situation.这些事件将使局势变得极其复杂。

5 implicit   

a.暗示的，含蓄的，不明晰的，绝对的

参考例句：

• A soldier must give implicit obedience to his officers. 士兵必须绝对服从他的长官。
• Her silence gave implicit consent. 她的沉默表示默许。

6 bias   

n.偏见，偏心，偏袒；vt.使有偏见

参考例句：

• They are accusing the teacher of political bias in his marking.他们在指控那名教师打分数有政治偏见。
• He had a bias toward the plan.他对这项计划有偏见。

7 maternal   

adj.母亲的，母亲般的，母系的，母方的

参考例句：

• He is my maternal uncle.他是我舅舅。
• The sight of the hopeless little boy aroused her maternal instincts.那个绝望的小男孩的模样唤起了她的母性。

8 entirely   

ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The fire was entirely caused by their neglect of duty. 那场火灾完全是由于他们失职而引起的。
• His life was entirely given up to the educational work. 他的一生统统献给了教育工作。

9 affordable   

adj.支付得起的，不太昂贵的

参考例句：

• The rent for the four-roomed house is affordable.四居室房屋的房租付得起。
• There are few affordable apartments in big cities.在大城市中没有几所公寓是便宜的。

10 leveraging   

促使…改变( leverage的现在分词 )； [美国英语]杠杆式投机，（使）举债经营，（使）利用贷款进行投机

参考例句：

• De-leveraging is a painful process: it has barely begun. 去杠杆化是个痛苦的过程：它才刚刚开始。
• Archimedes said, saying: Give me a fulcrum, I can leveraging the Earth. 阿基米德说过一句话：给我一个支点，我可以撬动地球。